


dream on up

by inconocible



Category: Star Wars: Rebels
Genre: 5+1 Things, Angst, Birthday Traditions, Blind Kanan Jarrus, Canonical Character Death, Cooking, Cuddles, Discussion of Alcohol Use, Discussion of Death, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Ezra Bridger Needs a Hug, F/M, Family Feels, Force Bond (Star Wars), Force Visions, Foreplay, Found Family, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Hopeful Ending, Hugs, Hurt/Comfort, Inexplicable and Unnatural Happenings, M-Rated Sex, M/M, Making Out, Past Character Death, People Talking Shit, Pregnancy, Slurs, Soft and Gentle Family Feels, The Force, There's A Lot of Food in this, Trust Issues, Unplanned Pregnancy, We Love A Family, getting naked, minor injury
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-15
Updated: 2018-10-15
Packaged: 2019-08-02 09:23:07
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 36,015
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16302488
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/inconocible/pseuds/inconocible
Summary: Ezra shifts his weight around a little, rubs a hand over the back of his neck before putting both his hands on his hips. “You’ve really changed how I feel about birthdays,” he says. He looks up at Kanan. “You’ve really changed how I feel about a lot of things,” he adds sincerely, and Hera can see the faint lines around Kanan’s eyes crinkle as his fond smile deepens.or: Birthdays on the Ghost through the years, through Hera’s eyes.





	1. 10 BBY

**Author's Note:**

> “Mixed-up times are overflowing with both pain and joy -- with vastly unjust patterns of pain and joy, with unnecessary killing of ongoingness but also with necessary resurgence. The task is to make kin in lines of inventive connection as a practice of learning to live and die well with each other in a thick present.” -- Donna Haraway, Staying with the Trouble
> 
> -
> 
> even when we’re way down, way down low  
> we dream, yeah, we dream on up  
> when we are way down, way down low  
> the stars light [a new hope in us](https://open.spotify.com/user/2zw5bo4zgmyzq7dfb9z9pnwjd/playlist/2dbqOMRLRs2GGnFIPxvoEF?si=JtxH5g8ZSKS5nPtXLjVtAw)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> with you, i found my rebel heart
> 
> -
> 
> tell me you don’t, it feels like you do  
> opening up can open some wounds

**i. - 10 BBY**

The night before Chopper’s day, Hera is quietly working in the galley, humming to herself under her breath, an old song she hasn’t thought of in awhile. As she hums the tune and focuses on what she’s doing, the banner she’s hanging up, she feels them like an old bruise: The memories she’s allowing to rise, slow and a little painful, to the surface. Tomorrow is Chopper’s day, and she’s doing what she always does on Chopper’s day.

It’s late, now, dinner finished, nearly time for bed, and Hera is doing what she always does: She’s carrying on. Chopper’s day is a hard day, for both her and for Chopper, but carrying on, treating it like any other birthday on Ryloth, that’s always helped. Even when they aren’t on Ryloth, it’s what she does -- it’s what _they_ do -- and it helps them both to carry on, to keep focusing on the positive, on the mission, on the hopes, on the dreams.

Hera has gotten better at remembering there’s another living being on the _Ghost_ , these past few months, but she’s so focused inwardly that Kanan catches her off-guard anyway, and she startles, nearly falls off of where she’s balanced somewhat precariously on the top of the back of the dejarik booth, reaching up to hang the banner, when he clears his throat and says, “Uh, need a hand?”

Hera glances over, scowls at him for making her jump, regains her balance with a firm hand pressed to the wall. He’s leaning in the doorway of the galley, one hip cocked out at a ridiculous angle, his hands resting at his waist, watching her with an expression of near-blankness, but for the glimmer of curiosity that breaks through.

“Nope, I’ve got it,” Hera says, her balance regained. She reaches up, finishing tacking the banner to the wall.

“I thought you heard me,” Kanan says, an apology between his words.

“How long have you been standing there?” Hera asks, not looking back at him yet, instead hopping off of the back of the booth, taking a couple steps back, taking a look at her work. The right side’s not quite high enough, she decides, and she climbs back up, untacks it, adjusts it.

“Couple minutes,” Kanan says.

Hera sighs as she gets down again. “Well, I guess I’m still --”

“Not used to having crew around,” Kanan finishes. “Yeah, so you’ve said,” he adds, amusement breaking over his face, a small smile playing at his lips.

“Well,” Hera says again. She doesn’t know what to say, isn’t sure if Kanan wants to know about Chopper’s day, isn’t really even sure how to explain it if he does.

Chopper breaks the moment, breaks through Hera’s thoughts, rolling at a break-neck speed into and through the galley, nearly bowling Kanan over, twittering insistently at Hera about the preparations for tomorrow -- specifically, that they’re nearly out of the special oil Hera always uses for his oil bath, and is she even going to give him one?

Hera laughs. “I know, I know,” she says. “We’ll do it in the morning, Chop.”

Chopper grumbles back at her, letting her know exactly what he thinks of going to bed tonight without an oil bath, and Hera rolls her eyes. “Oh, come on,” she says, propping her hands on her hips. “We’re parked on a desert planet. Wouldn’t you rather do it in the morning, after we go out, than now, and have to touch everything up in the morning anyway?”

Chopper starts in on a grumbling diatribe, something about _how did I get stuck with you anyway_ , and Hera laughs again. “Hey!” she exclaims, pointing a finger at him. “You better be thanking your lucky stars you got stuck with me, buddy,” she says.

Chopper rolls over to her, and she drops to one knee, getting on his eye level, familiar affection and old hurt surging through her, thinking of tomorrow, laying her hand on his dome. “Especially tomorrow,” she adds softly, and Chopper relents, lets her pet him for a moment, purring his contentment.

Kanan has just been standing there in the doorway with his hip popped out to one side this whole time, Hera realizes eventually, and she gets to her feet, swats Chopper softly on the back of his dome. “Why don’t you go plug in,” she says. “Get some rest.” Chopper chortles at her, tells her he’ll see her in the morning, that he expects that oil bath, and he rolls out of the room.

“You know,” Kanan finally says, popping his hips back into a straight line with his ribs, crossing the room, filling the electric kettle with water from the sink, setting it back on its base. “I think I’m finally starting to understand his dialect.”

Kanan opens the cabinet, takes out a mug, the tin of tea. “Want some?” he asks, already reaching for a second mug, and she nods.

This has somehow become something of a habit over the past few weeks, Hera joining Kanan for a quiet cup of tea if it’s late enough that he wants one and she’s not in her room for the night yet. It’s been strange, finding her habits slowly beginning to align with another being’s again, after a couple of intense years of sticking it out on her own with just Chopper and the _Ghost_ and the mission. Strange, but not necessarily unwelcome, she thinks, watching him drop a tea bag into each mug, put the tin back in the cabinet, all familiar movements to her, now.

Hera sits down at the dejarik table. “That’s good,” she says, replying to his comment about Chopper. “Especially if you’re going to start coming with us on missions more often.”

Kanan frowns at her from where he’s standing at the counter, waiting for the kettle to boil.

“Who said I was?” he asks, and Hera sighs, lifting her elbows to the table, dropping her chin into her hand.

“You’ll come around,” she tells him, which is pretty much what she’s been telling him for weeks, now, though so far he’s preferred to keep playing the part of the muscle, the hired gun -- has shied away from her more ideological missions, her more covert ops.

The kettle sings; Kanan lifts it from its base, pours hot water into both mugs, carries them to the table, sits down opposite her, both of them on either end of the booth. “Sure,” he says, dry, deadpan.

Hera is starting to think she knows better, starting to think he _will_ come around, if she gives him enough time, gives him enough evidence that the work she’s doing for Fulcrum really matters, wears him down to agreement. Sure, on ops he’s still all talk, showy, a swaggering, sharpshooting, devil-may-care cowboy, wild and crude, but after a few months of traveling together now, she thinks she’s starting to know better, to know more about Kanan’s true nature.

It’s in small, still moments like this, with both his hands wrapped around his mug, staring contemplatively at the curls of steam rising from the top of his hot tea, easily and wordlessly inviting her into his moment of evening silence, that Hera thinks maybe she’s seeing Kanan as he really is -- thoughtful, kind, sad.

He’s been slow to trust her, and, if she’s being honest with herself, she’s probably been even slower to trust him, despite the intensity of their adventure together on Gorse that brought him here in the first place. A slight tension still lingers between them when they’re planning a job, especially if the planning becomes too revolutionary for his tastes, makes him bow out. And sometimes, though less often now that they’ve been working together longer, she finds herself questioning him still in the thick of a fight, not quite able to anticipate his next move. It’s really been these quieter moments between them, she’s realized, that’ve finally started to put the foundations of mutual trust more solidly into place, finally started to wear away the wariness between them.

The first night she’d shared a cup of tea with him, one night a few weeks ago, after a particularly hard mission, she’d been extremely uncomfortable with his silence, accustomed only to either his respectful but near-total absence around the ship or his over-the-top cowboy persona on jobs, the two ways they’d mostly been relating to one another over the months since Gorse. But somehow, despite her discomfort that first night, it’s become something of a habit anyway, finding themselves sitting together over a cup of tea a couple nights a week, sharing the same space, barely speaking. She’s become increasingly comfortable with it, accustomed to it, to the realization that the strikingly contemplative silence he carries with him late at night is, perhaps, a way of him trusting her, inviting her in.

So she doesn’t feel like arguing with him right now, doesn’t feel like commenting on his tone, on the unspoken things that were there in the way he just said, “sure,” doesn’t feel like pushing the rebellion recruitment speech at him for the millionth time.

Instead she just leans back into the booth, blows a breath over the top of her mug, takes a sip of her tea, closes her eyes, sinking back into the memories hanging heavy in the front of her mind, the thoughts that kept her from hearing Kanan when he came in earlier, the feelings that always rise to the surface on Chopper’s day.

Long minutes pass, and she drinks her tea with her eyes closed and her memory full, and she’s nearly forgotten that Kanan is there, too lost in her own mind.

“So,” he finally says, nearly startling her again with his soft, neutral tone, curious, but not pushing. “What’s on your mind?”

She opens her eyes, looks at him over the lip of her mostly-empty mug. “What makes you think there is?” she asks.

He shrugs. “Just a feeling.” His mouth quirks to one side, and he glances up, over their heads, gestures at the banner she hung up earlier. “And, you know.”

Hera smiles, despite herself, as her gaze follows his gesture, up to the banner. It’s one of the few things she still hangs onto from home, the colors and patterns of it comforting, cheering. She’s always hung it up on her birthday and on Chopper’s day, even though it’s always just been the two of them. There’s just something about it, about the cloth her mom stitched together into this festive garland, that makes her feel connected, helps her remember the better things. Something about the faded earth tones and the patterns of the embroidery on the cloth, mirroring her clan’s markings, that grounds her in a welcome way, makes her feel closer to home, despite her constant desire to be out here in the stars.

“What’s that about?” Kanan asks, in lieu of her not giving him any kind of answer.

Hera shrugs. “It’s --” She sighs, knowing this is going to sound strange. “It’s Chopper’s birthday tomorrow.”

Kanan tilts his head to the side. “Droids don’t have birthdays,” he says slowly, and she feels herself scowling at him, despite herself. “Usually,” Kanan adds hastily.

“Chopper does,” Hera says.

Kanan considers her for a long moment. “So,” he says, “you’ve had him since he was manufactured? I always thought he was an older model.”

Hera sighs again. Stars, she hasn’t had to explain Chopper to anyone in -- years. Maybe ever. Everyone back home, from Ryloth, from the resistance, knew -- knew about her parents, knew about her mom, knew about the battle, knew about Chopper.

“He is an older model,” Hera says, wondering if Kanan, still such a stranger to her, really cares to know about all of this.

He’s still interested, she guesses, because he asks, “So, he -- knows his own manufacture date?”

Hera shakes her head. “We call it his birthday, but it’s actually the anniversary of the day I found him,” she says. “It’s easier, though, just to say it’s his birthday. Makes us both feel better.”

Kanan tilts his head to the other side, his eyes narrowing. “Most droid owners don’t celebrate the day they got their droids,” he says.

Hera sighs a third time, her memories making her breath feel heavy in her lungs. “I didn’t get Chopper the way most people get their droids,” she says. “He’s a veteran of the Clone Wars.”

Kanan’s lips compress into a thin line; something tenses in his jaw. Hera knows this is a touchy subject for him, despite the fact that she barely knows anything about him. She’s filled in enough of the blanks -- her suspicions about Kanan being a Jedi, the way he saved her back on Vidian’s ship, the stiffness that overcomes him any time anyone mentions the war. And now, now that she’s started this, brought this discomfort here between them, she feels like she has to at least tell him the part about Chopper, even if she isn’t ready to share about --

“There was a battle,” she says. “One of many over and on Ryloth. But this one was very close to our home.” Hera picks up her mug, gazes into it, buying herself a moment, trying to decide how much to tell, surprised, a bit, at her hesitancy to talk about this, even after so many years.

“I was young -- not too young to protect the house, but too young to go out and fight. So I was at home with a couple of my cousins,” she says. “Our parents were all out, fighting. And, all of a sudden, we heard this awful noise. At first we thought it was an airstrike, coming down on the house.”

She sits up, sighs again, leans her elbows on the table once more, finishes the last sip of her tea, sets her mug down, leans her chin into her hands. Kanan is watching her expectantly, listening intently.

“It was a ship, crashing,” Hera says. “A Republic Y-wing, right there in the courtyard of the house. Destroyed the front gate. We went out to look, and --” Hera shrugs, her chin rising and falling where it’s still cupped in her hands. “There was Chopper. His pilot died in the impact of the crash, and Chopper really didn’t want to leave him, but I climbed up and coaxed him out, brought him in, and he pretty much hasn’t left my side since then.”

“Mm,” Kanan hums thoughtfully.

There’s a silence that spools out between them, a silence in which Kanan studies Hera with that same careful, contemplative, slightly stiff expression.

“There’s something else,” Kanan says slowly, not quite a question.

Hera wants to be shocked, but she remembers her suspicions about him, about who he used to be, remembers the unnatural way he stretched out his hand to save her life over Gorse, and she wonders -- wonders what he knows about her; wonders, briefly, if he can read her mind. The thought unsettles her deeply, and she doesn’t feel like talking about her mom right now, anyway, so she doesn’t answer him, gets up abruptly from the table, turns her back to him, her lekku swishing sassily behind her as she crosses the room, sets her mug in the sink, letting it make a louder clatter than she normally would.

“Hera,” Kanan says.

“Don’t,” she says, surprising herself with how hard and angry it sounds, coming out of her. “Whatever it is you’re _doing_ \--”

“Hera,” he says again. He’s up now, at her side, putting his own mug in the sink, and he takes a step around to face her, his now-empty hands open defensively in front of his chest. “Listen, I’m not -- I’m not _doing_ anything,” he says. “I’m -- I can just --” He huffs out a sigh. “I can _feel_ that you’re upset, that there’s -- there’s something you’re trying very hard to ignore,” he says. “But I’d never --”

Hera crosses her arms over her chest, tilts her chin up at him disbelievingly, shielding herself, somehow, maybe, from whatever it is he knows about her, feeling strangely vulnerable, afraid that he can see right through her, right through to the thoughts of her mom in the front of her mind -- who knows, maybe he could just, reach in, and --

Kanan shakes his head, looks away at a distant point over her shoulder. “People -- people who are -- strong -- with the Force,” he starts haltingly, his voice dropping to a near-whisper, despite the fact that they’re alone, “they -- _we_ \-- can sometimes look into, or influence, other people’s minds, but, Hera --” He meets her gaze again, something earnest and nearly desperate in his eyes. “I swear to you, I would never, ever, do something like that, to a friend, without consent.” He huffs out another soft sigh. “But, strong feelings, especially coming from someone I’m -- someone I’m used to, attentive to -- I can’t help it sometimes, I just -- I can feel them, just like I can feel the heat of the sun when I walk outside. I can feel you.”

Hera considers him for a long, still moment, considers the open hurt on his face, the way he just called her _a friend_ , the way he’d said _used to, attentive_.

“Sometimes -- a lot of times -- I wish I couldn’t,” he admits, sighing out a soft exhale, closing his eyes briefly, shaking his head again. “But it’s not something I can just -- block out.”

“Okay,” she finally says, the conversation over, satisfied with the vulnerable sincerity in his face, the odd, certain sense she’s getting that he’s never told this to anyone, not since --

He nods, swallows, doesn’t have anything more to offer.

She lets out a breath she didn’t realized she’d been holding, deflating from her flare of suspicion. “Good night,” she says, and she turns away from him again, starts for her cabin.

“Good night,” he calls softly after her.

It takes forever for Hera to fall asleep that night, her memories of her mom mixed up so tight in the way Kanan had said _I can feel you_ , everything more complicated, and more painful, than it ought to be.

-

Hera spends the next day inadvertently teaching Kanan how to celebrate a birthday on Ryloth.

It’s just her usual day with Chopper, their usual traditions, but it feels strange to have Kanan there, with them. After their discussion last night, she’d been afraid that Kanan would avoid her again, would go off into the town on his own for a drink or five, something he’s still prone to doing on days they aren’t running a mission, though it’s been happening less and less often, as their time together has gone on.

But he doesn’t. Instead, he stays unusually close by, walking two steps behind her in the market first thing in the morning, before breakfast, as she buys the nice oil for Chopper’s joints and a small basket of fresh meiloorun, feeling pleased with herself for choosing this planet specifically because her favorite fruit grows natively here, is easier to come by in the markets, cheaper.

“You never go out of your way to get any kind of food other than ration bars,” Kanan teases her goodnaturedly. “I’m shocked.”

She thinks about his indignance during his first few days on board at her lack of “real food,” as he always calls it; about the way he always volunteers to cook, is always venturing out and coming back with something new, something she’s never tasted before.

“I like to have something special on a birthday,” she says, glancing over her shoulder at Kanan, shifting the weight of the basket from one hand to the other.

He takes this in with a small, silent nod as he follows her through the market, which is starting to get full, most people finishing up their breakfasts and heading to work.

“Do you want anything other than fruit?” he asks, watching her as she sets the basket on the dejarik table once they’re back.

She turns to him, shrugs, thinking primarily about the things she needs for Chopper’s oil bath. “I don’t know,” she says. The truth is that she doesn’t really care -- food’s usually just food, for the most part, though she’s learned over the past few months that Kanan tends to ascribe more significance to it than she always has.

She hustles Chopper into the cargo bay, pulls out all the things she needs -- clean microfiber cloths, different oils and cleaning compounds, her toolbox, to do some minute adjustments, even the can of touch-up paint -- and she loses herself in the familiar motions of maintencing him, the steps comforting.

Chopper’s mostly silent, lost, she knows, in his own thoughts, his own strange memories of that day. Of course Hera wipes specific things from his drive -- mostly, the locations of any secret missions she takes him on -- but she’s let him keep all his other memories intact, removed all the control programming she could when she first found him, wrote a free will code in its place. There’s something about knowing she can trust Chopper with her secrets, knowing that his near-murderous devotion to her is his own choice -- something that’s always made her feel less alone, always made Chopper feel more like kin than machine.

She’s nearly done with Chopper when she starts to smell something, something punching through the scent of the oils and the cleaning compounds -- something cooking in the galley.

She finishes up, sliding the microfiber over his dome, stands up, stretches her arms behind her. “I guess Kanan cooked?” she says, and she wanders into the galley to find out.

“There you are,” Kanan says as she walks in, Chopper on her heels. Kanan has dragged the rice cooker out, and there’s plates and bowls and pans out all over the counters, and --

“What’s all this?” Hera asks.

Kanan shrugs, a little sheepish, ducks his head. “I thought --” He clears his throat. “Well, it’s not a birthday without a little something special, right?” he asks, setting full, beautiful plates and bowls on the table.

The food is delicious, decadent and sweet -- hot, sweet sticky rice with slices of meiloorun atop it, sprinkled with sesame seeds, and pancakes, thin, really more like crepes, with diced meiloorun cooked in, large dollops of whipped cream on top. They dig in without much conversation past Hera’s exclamations of delight in the back of her throat, Kanan’s answering smile around his fork.

“This is fantastic,” Hera says through a bite. “But it’s so much -- you didn’t have to.”

Kanan shrugs. “I haven’t had a reason to celebrate a birthday in awhile,” he says, and Hera frowns.

“What about your own?” she asks, but he just shakes his head.

“This one’s better,” he says.

-

The day stretches on until it’s evening, after dinner, and now it’s _really_ time to show Kanan how birthdays are celebrated on Ryloth, on this ship.

Hera clears the dinner dishes and puts them in the sink, and Kanan sits at the table, watching her expectantly as she lingers by the sink, leaning against the counter, Chopper waiting for her back at the table.

“There are a few traditions we observe for birthdays,” she tells him, figuring if he’s gonna stick around, he might as well be invited -- maybe he’ll even let her celebrate his birthday, whenever it is. She’s been thinking all afternoon about what he said at lunch, about not celebrating his own birthday, and it makes her sadder than she thought it would, for some reason.

She holds her right hand in front of her, ticking the items off with the forefinger and thumb of her left hand, wrapping in sequence around the fingers of her right. “Chopper hasn’t had to do any chores today, he got a special oil bath. Food we like.” She glances over at Kanan, smiling. “More than usual,” she adds. She sighs, looks up at the banner. “My mom made that,” she says. “Reminds us of home.”

Hera sighs, crosses the room, sits down at the table, lays her hand on Chopper’s dome. “On Ryloth, children honor their parents on their birthdays. Something small, really, just making sure to say thanks, to express gratitude.” She sighs again, this part so, so hard for her to tell, so private. “Chopper and I -- we sort of do the same.”

Chopper trills sadly, a wordless expression of long-seated loss, and he projects an image. “That’s Chopper’s old master,” Hera says. The projection shifts, the image Hera only ever wants to look at once or twice a year, doesn’t like to linger on too long. “And that’s my mom,” she says, staring intensely at the image, leaning her weight a little more into Chopper. “The same battle that killed Chopper’s master -- she --” Hera sighs again, swallows around the lump that’s risen up, unbidden, into her throat. She doesn’t usually have to _talk_ about this, usually can just remember, silently, can say the ritualistic words and know that Chopper understands, can --

“You don’t have to,” Kanan says softly.

“No,” Hera says. “No, I --” She shakes her head. “It’s important to remember,” she says, but she closes her eyes, takes a couple deep breaths in through her nose, trying to center herself. “In the same battle that killed Chopper’s master,” Hera starts again, her voice shaky, “my mom was hit, injured, by Separatist fire. She held on for a couple days, but --” Hera shakes her head, her eyes achingly dry, her throat so tight she feels like she has to gasp for her breath. “She didn’t make it,” she finishes. “Chopper -- we were there for each other, when no one else was.”

Hera sucks in a couple more breaths through her nose, and Chopper dims the projection, rolling closer to her, pressing into her knees. “We honor them and we thank them,” she murmurs, the words familiar, rote, comforting, after the upsetting jolt of having to explain. “For giving us life, and for giving us a reason to keep fighting.”

A slot in Chopper’s midsection slides open, and his small flamethrower tool extends, a careful flame lit on the end.

“And we make a wish, that we use the upcoming year to continue to honor them and to continue to improve ourselves,” Hera ends, smiling. “Okay,” she says, “make your wish, Chop,” and he twitters out an affirmative. Hera leans forward, blows out the flame, and she smiles, exhales, feeling drained, exhausted, but strangely okay with it.

She glances up at Kanan, who looks at her in return, says nothing. He gets wordlessly, damn near soundlessly, up from the table, crosses the room, fills the electric kettle, gets two mugs down without even asking her. While the water heats, he turns, leans against the counter, crosses his arms across his chest, looking at her in that same curious, careful way he had the night before. The kettle sings, and he pours the water into the mugs, brings them to the table, passes her one, sits back down.

“Thanks,” he finally says, when they’ve both gotten at least halfway through their tea.

She looks at him across the table. “For what?” she asks.

He shrugs again, and what he says isn’t at all what Hera was expecting: “Trusting me,” he says. “With -- all of that.”

Hera smiles. “It --” She isn’t quite sure how to say it, and she wants to say it right, so she pauses, thinks. “Remembering,” she says. “It hurts, but it’s a good thing, I think, when it’s done right alongside celebrating. Gives me hope. Hope that things can get better, that someday we’ll have the future they always wanted.”

Kanan smiles in return. “Hope, huh,” he says. “Haven’t had a lot of that, past few years.”

“Well, stick around,” Hera tells him. “We’ll get there.” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hi, i accidentally a bang length for my minibang, which i know is pretty ridiculous, so thanks for reading <3 many more notes at the end of chapter 6.
> 
> i made [a playlist for this fic](https://open.spotify.com/user/2zw5bo4zgmyzq7dfb9z9pnwjd/playlist/2dbqOMRLRs2GGnFIPxvoEF?si=jSPEBmwYS7uxymT9XXrlOQ) because i’m Like That. the opening and closing track, way down low by elley duhe, is the Big Mood for this, and then there are two mood tracks per chapter. check it out if you want a mood.
> 
> the biggest shoutout and all my love to my artist for this minibang, [esmiora](http://esmiora.tumblr.com/)!! they were SO fun to work with and i love, love, LOVE [the art they made for chapter ii](http://esmiora.tumblr.com/post/179088473579/my-first-of-two-contributions-for-the) <3 <3 <3 
> 
> the moods for this chapter - found by halleway, i’m with you by vance joy, and way down low by elley duhe


	2. 5 BBY

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i don’t wanna say it, but maybe it was fate  
> and i cannot contain it  
> and i know, and i know it’s a different love  
> and i know, and i know you make me better  
> it’s a love that will keep me holding on  
> and i know, and i know we only get better
> 
> -
> 
> but with what we have  
> i promise you that  
> we’re marchin on

**ii. - 5 BBY**

The night before Kanan’s birthday, Hera wakes up to an empty bed.

She groans, stretches her arms over her head, glances at the chrono across the room. It’s only 0347, too early even for her to be up herself, much less for Kanan, on a usual morning. She frowns; his side of the bed is cold, as though he’s been gone awhile.

She rolls from one side to the other, pointing her toes, pushing the covers away, stretching out her legs. All her muscles are sore and aching, but in the best way, the twinge in her core a reminder of the very good sex they just had, hours ago. She stretches her muscles and she smiles as she recalls the way she’d caught him around his middle as he’d helped her hang the birthday banner, had pushed him against the wall of the galley, kissing him; had dragged him down the hall to her room, teasing him about giving him an early birthday present as she’d shoved him down, sunken to her knees at the edge of the bunk, taken him in her mouth, her mouth and her hands always and already his, but this particular moment one given freely, with gladness and ease -- a gift. After she’d finished him off, after he’d taken a couple minutes to recover, he’d pulled her up to the bed, kissed his way down her body, slid his face between her legs to return the favor, given it back to her just as good -- if not better -- than what she’d given to him. They’d relaxed, after, taken a long time to fall asleep, enjoying being curled around one another, Kanan pressing lazy kisses up and down her lekku, touching her slowly, coaxing one more climax out of her, hazy and sleepy and blissful. This -- this had been a really good night. She’d felt so relaxed in both her body and her mind when she’d finally fallen asleep, so content with him snuggled in next to her.

So why is he up already?

Hera sighs, rolls out of bed, pulls on soft leggings and an old sweater, too early for her flight suit, not just yet, when there’s still a chance she might go back to bed. The ship is chilly as she goes to the fresher; before setting off to find Kanan, she goes back to her room, pulls on a pair of socks and her running shoes.

The whole _Ghost_ is silent, as it should be, at this hour, Sabine and Zeb in their rooms, Chopper charging in the cockpit. Hera knocks softly on Kanan’s door. “Kanan?” she calls, but there’s no answer. She hesitates for a moment before keying in the override access code, but when the door slides open, it’s like she thought -- he’s not in there, the cabin quiet and still.

Hera walks through the galley, smiles to see the birthday banner up on the wall above the dejarik booth, her heart always cheered the sight of the familiar cloth. But although the galley is the other place she’d kind of expected to find Kanan, he’s not there, either.

Hera frowns, thinks, looks around. She heads down to the cargo hold, and he’s not there, either, but the ramp is lowered, chilly air blowing in. She definitely didn’t leave the ramp down -- the _Ghost_ is set down right now in the Lothali grasslands, an uninhabited section of the plains a few klicks outside Kothal, a favored setting-down spot of theirs, recently, ever since they started taking more jobs from Vizago. She’s positive she locked everything up tight before she and Kanan went to bed; he must have recently lowered the ramp.

Hera takes a few steps down the ramp, wrapping her arms around her chest against the cool air. Fall’s been starting to take over Lothal, the past couple of weeks, the trees’ leaves starting to change color, the grasses on the plains starting to become brittle. There’s a dry, cold breeze blowing now, one that threatens to cut through the soft yarns of Hera’s sweater, and the sound of the grasses rustling in the wind reminds her, almost, of the sound of the ocean lapping at the shore, back on Ryloth.

“Kanan?” she calls from halfway down the ramp.

The plains are illuminated by Lothal’s bright twin moons, and she looks around for clues. The grass leading off to the right is slightly flattened; she sighs and starts slowly following the path of the flatter grass, picking her way through the plain. The path leads around the _Ghost_ , and she finally spots him, sitting in the tall grass with his back turned to the nose of the ship, kneeling in a familiar, contemplative pose, looking out toward the mountain ridge in the distance.

“Kanan?” Hera calls again as she approaches, but he doesn’t stir.

She kneels down next to him, the muscles of her core and her hips twinging a bit as she moves, laying a hand on his shoulder. “What is it?” she asks softly.

He sighs, his shoulder rising and falling under her hand as his breath moves, but he doesn’t say anything.

Hera leans in. “You okay?” she asks, pressing her lips to the chilly edge of his ear, her hand running from his shoulder to his elbow.

Neither of them have ever been exactly what Hera would call sound sleepers, and finding Kanan up and meditating in the middle of the night isn’t something that especially surprises her, but she still finds herself struck by the urge to fix whatever it is that’s not right, to drag him back to bed, warm him up.

“I don’t know,” he sighs.

“What is it, love?” Hera asks again, leaning in close to him, laying the side of her head on his shoulder.

“It’s --” he shakes his head. “I’ve been having these -- these dreams.”

“Bad ones?” Hera asks.

“I don’t know,” he says again. “There’s always -- there’s always this kid, and -- and sometimes I think I can hear Master Depa’s voice, too.”

Hera frowns. Kanan almost never voluntarily talks about that part of his life. “A kid?” she asks.

“I don’t know,” he says for a third time, frustration in the way his shoulder tenses under Hera’s head. “I just keep feeling like he’s -- ours.” He glances over and down at her, quick, nervous; Hera looks up, meets his gaze, picks her head up from his shoulder.

“Kanan,” she says, reaching for one hand where it rests on his thigh, laying her hand on top of his. “You know how I feel about that.”

He sighs. “I know,” he says, looking away. “It’s not -- I don’t know how to explain it.” Kanan shakes his head. “He’s always calling me, and I’m always thinking --” He looks at her. “Sometimes I can hear her saying, you’ll understand when you have your own -- and -- I don’t know,” he finishes.

“Hmm,” Hera hums thoughtfully, laying her head back against his shoulder, shivering as a particularly fierce gust of wind hits. “Is this new?”

Kanan shifts a little, wraps his arm around her, pulls her a little closer, turns his head, tucking the top of her head under his chin. “No,” he says. “Every time we’ve been here, on Lothal, for at least,” he pauses, thinks. “Six months?”

“Six _months_?” Hera echos back, surprised that it’s taken him this long to say anything.

“It’s something about this place,” he says. “It’s like it’s -- like he -- whoever he is -- he’s calling me.” Kanan shakes his head. “At first I just thought -- I don’t know,” he says. “Visions are -- you should take them very skeptically. And they weren’t so -- so clear, at first, as they are now.” He sighs again, his warm breath skating along the base of her lekku, sending a shiver down her spine that has nothing to do with the weather. “Just now, it was so clear, like if I could just reach out a little farther --” He sighs again.

“What do you think it means?” Hera asks.

He’s quiet, doesn’t answer her for a long moment.

“Kanan?” she asks.

“I don’t know,” he says again. He sighs, tilts his head down, presses his lips to her forehead. “You’re freezing,” he murmurs.

“You wanna go back to bed?” she asks.

He shifts his weight around, lets her go, gets to his feet, offers her his hand, pulls her up. They walk back to the ship, hand in hand, and she pauses to close the ramp when they’re inside the cargo hold, the interior of the ship cool, now, from it having been left open for so long.

They don’t speak again until they’re back in Hera’s room. She kicks off her shoes, but she leaves her socks and leggings and sweater on for now as she slides in under the covers, shivering a little still; Kanan slides out of his boots and his shirt but leaves his soft sleep pants, which Hera kind of can’t believe he wore outside in the first place, on.

Hera wriggles into the circle of his arms, her head on his shoulder, both of her cold lekku tucked between their chests, one of her feet sliding between his calves, sighing contentedly as she settles in.

“Sorry I got you up,” Kanan says.

Hera shakes her head, smooths a hand over his chest, running her fingers through the dark, soft hairs that cover it. “I’m sorry you had to start your birthday like that, love,” she says.

“Hmph,” Kanan says, a huff of amusement from the back of his throat, and he smiles for the first time since they fell asleep, earlier tonight. “I think my birthday started pretty kriffing good,” he drawls, his voice dropping low and sultry and teasing, sliding his hand under her sweater, running his hand up and down her ribs, drawing her closer, leaning his hips into hers.

“Yeah?” she asks him, breathy, shivering into his touch.

“Yeah,” he says, his hand sliding out from under her sweater, running up her side, up her arm, up her neck, up to cup her chin, tilting it up to his. “You always make my birthday good,” he whispers, his lips brushing hers, kissing her.

-

The next day, they do all the traditions, go through all the celebratory rituals they’ve established for themselves as a family -- spend a nice, slow day, all together. Kanan makes pancakes in the morning, and there’s a bowl of shuura and jogan and muja on the table -- meiloorun notoriously difficult to find on Lothal, especially at this time of the year -- and Sabine trims his hair for him after breakfast, symbolically getting rid of the dead ends, straightening everything up. Sabine and Zeb help with a new tradition, one that Sabine brought aboard -- one hit for every year old the birthday person is, slowly sneaking in twenty-seven affectionate punches over the course of the day. In the afternoon, the five of them, Hera and Kanan and Zeb and Sabine and Chopper, take a long walk from the _Ghost_ to the mountain range beyond them, and Sabine races Kanan and Zeb up every hill, and it warms Hera’s heart to see them all together, so relaxed, having such a _normal_ day, for once.

After their hike and an afternoon catnap and a delicious dinner of spicy, hot stew made with bantha belly and kimchi -- courtesy of Zeb-- they all squeeze in to the dejarik booth, and Kanan sighs. Sabine and Zeb bring out a small cake they made while Kanan and Hera napped after the hike -- it’s jogan, frosted with vanilla icing, and there’s a single candle stuck in the top.

“I love it,” Kanan says. “Thanks, you two.”

“Unfortunately there’s only one candle,” Zeb jokes, “because if we’d have used the proper amount, I think we would’ve burned the whole ship down.”

“Very funny,” Kanan grumbles, but he smiles, anyway. “I’ve really enjoyed spending time with you guys today,” he adds, looking around at all of them. “Thank you.”

Kanan sighs, his smile fading, and he fishes into his pocket for something. Hera’s surprised to see that it’s his Jedi holocron, something he normally keeps tucked safely away in his room.

“You know that in this family, on our birthdays, we don’t only enjoy each other’s company, we also honor those who came before us, those who are departed,” he says, soft, serious, and Sabine and Zeb nod. Hera wonders where’s he’s going with this. In the past, he’s always just said her name, extremely intentionally -- _Depa Billaba, and all the others who were killed during the war_. He holds his hand out, and the holocron floats six inches above his palm, pieces of it moving and twisting as it floats.

“Woah,” Sabine says.

“We honor them, and we thank them,” Kanan says, the line from the Ryl blessing familiar to all five of them now, “for giving us life, and for giving us a reason to keep fighting.”

There’s a faint image projecting from the holocron, now, a video recording paused in the middle of playback, and Hera’s never seen the woman’s face before, but she knows -- she knows her, somehow.

“I will not always be with you,” Depa’s recording says, the playback beginning, her voice rich, gentle, wise, everything Hera had expected her to sound like, somehow. “But you will always have your curious, questioning mind. Keep asking those questions, young one. It is how you will continue to grow.” She smiles. “May the Force be with you, always,” she says.

The recording ends, Depa’s figure fades away, and the holocron lingers there, floating six inches above Kanan’s outstretched palm for a long, still moment, until he sighs, curls his fingers in, the pieces of it that had twisted out a moment ago twisting back in. The holocron drops into his palm, and he closes his fingers around it, sighs deeply, sets it on the table, scrubs his hand over his face.

“Okay,” he sighs, so quietly Hera nearly misses it, even though she’s sitting right next to him.

He lifts his hand from his face. “Chopper?” he asks, smiling again, and Chopper twitters, rolls a little closer to the table, extends his flamethrower, lights the candle on the cake.

“And, you know, we make a wish, that we use the upcoming year to continue to honor them, and to continue to improve ourselves,” he says.

Hera lays a hand on Kanan’s back as he leans forward, blows out the candle. Zeb and Sabine clap, saying, “Happy birthday!” but the mood is more subdued than usual, and they’re all quiet as Kanan slices the cake, passes slices around.

After the cake is gone and the galley is cleaned up, Kanan puts his arm around Hera’s waist, walks quietly with her to her room.

(“You don’t want tea?” she’d asked him, five minutes ago, and he’d shaken his head.

“I just wanna lay down,” he’d said, weary.)

“You okay?” she asks him, when the door closes behind them.

He lets go of her waist, carefully reaches up to pull her cap off. She lets him, standing still, her hands drifting to his hips. He chucks the cap vaguely in the direction of her dresser, and he pulls her to him, bows his head, presses his face into the bare skin between her lekku. Hera shivers, and her arms slide up from his hips to his waist, wrap around him.

“I don’t know,” he whispers, his breath warming the valley between her lekku.

“Come to bed,” Hera says.

He nods, says, “Yeah,” but they just stand there for a long moment, holding each other.

“What is it?” Hera finally asks, shifting a little in his embrace, running one of her hands over the small of his back.

Kanan sighs. “I was just thinking -- I think I’m as old now as my master was when she was being appointed to the High Council.” He huffs out a laugh, a hurt sound. “And what have I done with my life?”

“Kanan,” Hera says, pulling back, looking up, looking him in the eye. She lays one hand on his cheek. “You’ve _survived._ ”

“Yeah,” he sighs. “I guess I have.” He shakes his head. “I guess I just feel like -- like there’s something more I’m meant to be doing. Like, like there’s something calling me, but -- I don’t know what it is.”

“Hm,” Hera hums thoughtfully, running her thumb over the ridge of his jaw. “Well, if there is, you’ll know it when it comes along.”

“I don’t know,” Kanan says again.

Hera smiles. “I do,” she says.

-

Kanan’s melancholy mood on his birthday, the dream he trusted her with the night before -- these things aren’t particularly easy to forget, but, in the long run of things, they aren’t particularly remarkable, either.

Hera certainly hasn’t forgotten them in the span of just a few weeks, in the couple of months that pass between his birthday and the routine op that gets interrupted by some kid Kanan finds on the street. She’s thinking intensely of the troubled way he’d gotten out of bed in the middle of the night when he falls into the co-pilot’s seat, grumbling about this _kid_ , when she demands, “Spill it.”

But the months pass, busier than ever with Ezra becoming such an important part of their lives, of their family, and with their missions becoming more complex, more dangerous, and the memory, the moment, slides out of her mind.

It comes back to her, though, the day they’re almost caught during the mission to meet with Senator Trayvis. She feels Ezra’s dashed hopes, doesn’t want him to lose hope altogether over one mission gone wrong, tells him there’s nothing wrong with them for wanting to believe someone’s a good person, for having hope.

Later that night, Hera’s finally getting ready to go to bed, and she finds Kanan, in his pajamas already, kneeling in the middle of her bedroom, his eyes closed, his brow knitted in troubled thought.

She lays one hand lightly on the top of his hair as she passes him, as she puts away her datapad, as she takes off her clothes, changes into her pajamas.

Hera sits on the edge of the bed, and Kanan sighs, opens his eyes, looks at her. “Nothing’s clear,” he grumbles, and he gets to his feet, sits next to her on the edge of the bed.

“Maybe you should tell Ezra that,” Hera says gently.

Kanan looks at her sidelong. “What do you mean?” he asks.

“I think you kind of brushed him off today. Don’t you remember how it felt when you were having those visions about Ezra, before we met him?” she asks, taking his hand. “How much they rattled you?”

“They didn’t _rattle_ me,” Kanan says, but Hera raises one eyebrow, her mouth quirking down into a half-frown.

“The night before your birthday last year?” she counters.

“Okay,” Kanan admits, “yeah, so what about it?”

“So you should _tell_ him,” Hera says. “I think Ezra spent so much time on his own, it’s -- he doubts himself.” She sighs. “I think it’d help, if you told him it’s not just discipline and training. It’s not just _him_ who misinterprets, or feels upset by these things sometimes, feels misled by the Force, you know?”

Kanan sighs, squeezes her hand. “Yeah,” he says. “You’re right.” He closes his eyes for a moment, then opens them. “He’s still up,” he says.

“Well, then, go on,” Hera says.

Kanan nods, gets to his bare feet, walks halfway to the door. He pauses, turns, looks back at her. “What did you tell him, earlier?” he asks. “I knew -- he reminds me of you so much, sometimes. You idealists.” Hera rolls her eyes, but Kanan smiles. “I knew you’d know the right thing to say. I needed some distance.”

“I told him that there’s nothing wrong with having the hope that things can get better.” Hera smiles at him, at how much she loves him, at how well, sometimes, she feels like they balance one another -- an idealist and a realist, often meeting in the middle with pragmatism, but sometimes needing each others’ opposite sides. “And -- that they will,” she says.

Kanan smiles. “Definitely the right thing.”

“And now he needs to hear the right thing from you,” Hera says. “Not a line about training and discipline -- he needs _you_ , Kanan. He needs to know he’s not alone.”

“He’s not,” Kanan says softly, his expression turning serious again. “He’ll never be.”

Hera smiles. “I know,” she says. “Just make sure Ezra knows that, too, love.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> the biggest shoutout and all my love to my artist for this minibang, [esmiora](http://esmiora.tumblr.com/)!! they were SO fun to work with and i love, love, LOVE [the art they made for this chapter](http://esmiora.tumblr.com/post/179088473579/my-first-of-two-contributions-for-the). thank you SO much for claiming my story and for making my imagination come to life. working with you was just such a lovely experience, and i loved that we could both mutually pull back the curtains for one another and be part of the creation process together <3 <3 <3 
> 
> the moods for this chapter - better by syml, and marching on by onerepublic


	3. 3 BBY

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> can’t keep talking while the years go by  
> gotta go whole heart, this time
> 
> -
> 
> i would do the crime, spend the time with you  
> ride or die, cause we in the same, crew

**iii. - 3 BBY**

In the days before Ahsoka’s birthday, Hera finds herself increasingly surprised, in a good way, by how much Ezra’s come out of his shell in the past year and a half -- and how much Kanan has, too, in his own way.

Sure, it was Rex’s idea to celebrate in the first place. But it’s Ezra who’s truly advocating for it, and it’s Kanan who’s backing him up.

“I think we should do it,” Ezra’s saying, bouncing on the balls of his feet in the cockpit after making his case, explaining Rex’s intel. “Kanan said we could.”

“Hey,” Kanan says, pointing a finger at Ezra from where he’s leaning his hip against the back of the co-pilot’s seat. “What I said was, we needed to ask Hera to see what she thought.”

“Okay, but you didn’t say no,” Ezra counters, and an easy, affectionate smile breaks over Kanan’s face, something that’s been so common on him, the past year and a half or so that they’ve had Ezra in their lives, something that Hera loves to see. “So what do you think?” Ezra asks.

“I have to admit I’m a little surprised,” Hera says. She considers Ezra for a long moment, his youthful energy, his desire to do something nice for no real reason other than being nice, making some fun. “I didn’t really think you liked celebrating birthdays.”

Ezra frowns. “I don’t like celebrating _my_ birthday,” he says. “Or, at least, I used to not like it. But I like how _we_ celebrate birthdays.” He looks between Hera and Kanan. “Like, Sabine’s and Zeb’s? Those were fun. You guys know how to make it fun, how to make it something to look forward to, to hope to make it to. Even though it’s nothing super special, just -- just knowing there’s gonna be a day together, to celebrate, to do something, I don’t know, fun, and, and normal? I’m kinda really looking forward to my next birthday now.” Ezra shifts his weight around a little, rubs a hand over the back of his neck before putting both his hands on his hips. “You’ve really changed how I feel about birthdays,” he says. He looks up at Kanan. “You’ve really changed how I feel about a lot of things,” he adds sincerely, and Hera can see the faint lines around Kanan’s eyes crinkle as his fond smile deepens.

Kanan lays his hand on Ezra’s shoulder.

Ezra looks back at Hera. “I really wanna share that with Ahsoka, and Rex wants to do something nice, too, so, uh, can we?” Ezra asks, and she nods.

“Sure, why not,” she says, something warm and sweet settled over her heart, inside her chest, something almost too tender to think about too closely, something almost overwhelming. “Let’s do it.”

“Yes!” Ezra exclaims. “We have a lot to do,” he says, and he slides out from under Kanan’s hand, sets off at a near-run out of the cockpit, his footsteps echoing in the hall outside.

Kanan sits down on the side of the co-pilot’s seat, angling his knees over toward Hera.

“This is your fault,” Kanan says, a smile playing around his mouth.

Hera scoffs, but she smiles, angles her own knees around in her seat, turning to face him. “And how, exactly, is Ezra planning a birthday thing for Ahsoka _my_ fault?”

Kanan shrugs. “Like he said. You’re the one who’s always made everyone’s birthdays feel fun again. Mine included.”

“Hm,” Hera hums thoughtfully. “You’ve gotta have something small to look forward to, hope for. It’s the least we can do for each other, right?”

Kanan reaches across the space between them, lays his hand on her knee, squeezes it, smiles that easy, fond smile at her. “Right,” he says.

“Anyway,” Hera says, arching an eyebrow at him. “I actually think it's your fault.”

“ _My_ fault?” he asks, looking more offended than he probably really is. “How is any of this my fault?”

Hera smiles at him, lays her hand over his, on her knee. “You'd let that kid do anything he wanted,” she says, warm, fond.

Kanan opens his mouth, draws a breath to object, but he closes his mouth a moment later, sighs, overly dramatic, the way he does when he's trying to act like he doesn't want to admit she's right. “Within reason,” he hedges. “I'd let Ezra do pretty much anything he wanted, within reason. And, this? Is reasonable.”

“Okay, you soft heart,” Hera teases him, squeezing his hand.

-

It’s only a handful of days that pass between when Hera says yes and when Ahsoka’s ship lands in the spaceport next to the _Ghost_ , but it’s been a good handful of days. Light, almost normal feeling days. It’s been a group effort, keeping everything a surprise, figuring out a good excuse to get Ahsoka out to Garel without telling her why. Ezra wants things to be the way Hera’s always wanted them to be, and it warms her, the reverence with which he treats her mom’s birthday banner, the insistence he puts on having something good to eat, the way he smiles when he asks Rex to help him figure out a good spot to go on a hike, a favorite recent birthday activity.

They’ve managed to get something good for dinner -- nerf ribs in a tangy, garlicky sauce, and a big bowl of fresh shuura and jogan and muja fruit -- and Ezra helped Hera hang the banner up last night, the colors feeling unusually bright and cheery against Garel’s rainy season, and everything feels peaceful, excited, happy, almost as though someone has pressed pause on the war. Kanan and Rex have even been managing to get along, united, for the most part under the cause of working together with the kids to brighten up Ahsoka’s day.

“She’s here!” Sabine’s calling, and everyone’s whispering, giggling, ducking behind the dejarik booth, under the table, into the shadowy corners of the room. Kanan pulls Hera to him in the corner behind the booth, one of his hands landing on her waist, and he smiles down at her, his face almost in shadow. “Your fault,” Kanan whispers. Hera rolls her eyes, shakes her head.

“Your fault,” she whispers back.

Chopper, from the portal on the side of the room, turns out the lights in the whole ship, plunging them into pitch-black darkness.

“Don’t you think that’s a little much?” Hera grumbles, but someone hisses, “Shh!” and she shakes her head, sighs.

There’s the sound of footsteps in the cargo bay, on the rungs of the ladder up to the hall.

“Hello?” Ahsoka’s voice drifts through the ship. “Rex?”

“In here,” Rex calls.

Her footsteps grow louder and nearer. “What’s --” she starts, suspicion in her voice. As she crosses the threshold of the galley, Chopper abruptly brings the lights up, and everyone follows Ezra and Sabine’s cue, popping out of their hidden places, yelling out, “Surprise!” and, “Happy birthday!”

Ahsoka’s mouth falls open, and she belatedly, slowly, covers it with her hand, looking around at them all, at the banner above the table.

“What --” she starts again. Sabine and Ezra and Zeb and Rex are all laughing.

“Are you surprised?” Ezra exclaims.

“Very,” Ahsoka says, and she smiles. “In a good way,” she adds, and Hera feels herself relax.

Rex is crossing the room, putting one arm heavily around Ahsoka’s shoulders. “You didn’t think I’d forget, did you?” he’s asking her.

Ahsoka laughs, something high and clear and sweet, something Hera isn’t sure she’s heard before. “Oh, Rex,” Ahsoka sighs. “Of course you remembered.”

Rex leans in closer, whispers something in her ear that Hera can’t make out, and Ahsoka’s eyes drift closed, and she’s leaning into him, turning to wrap her arms around his neck. Rex lets her, tightens his embrace on her more securely, and he bends his head, presses a brief and familiar kiss between her montrals.

“Are you even still allowed to call me that?” Ahsoka’s asking him as she pulls back from the hug. “I’m as tall you now, _Rexter_.”

Rex laughs. “Ah, but, you see, to me, you’ll always be little ‘Soka,” he says, and he lets go of her, crossing the room again, everyone settling down into the booth.

“Thank you,” Ahsoka says, looking around at all of them. “You’re all very kind.”

“Rex said you probably haven’t celebrated your birthday in a really long time,” Ezra says.

Ahsoka laughs again. “He’s right,” she admits. “I just never have a good reason. And --”

“Bad memories,” Sabine offers.

“Yes,” Ahsoka says sadly.

“Well,” Ezra says. “Me too, but, uh, we’re _really_ good at doing birthdays around here. At making them fun again.”

“Although we will have to punch you thirty-two times,” Sabine adds.

“Sabine,” Kanan says, but Ahsoka is laughing at that.

“I wouldn’t expect anything less,” Ahsoka says.

“We’ll make up for it with food,” Zeb offers.

“Perfect,” Ahsoka says.

-

The only wrench in Ezra and Rex’s planning is the rainy spell that’s been deluging Garel for the past few weeks.

“We usually go on a hike or do something fun outside,” Ezra tells Ahsoka, after the third game of dejarik and conversation over caf. He’s getting restless, Hera can tell, and so is everyone else.

“Hey, Hera,” Sabine says slyly, the way she does when she’s got an idea.

“Yeah?” Hera asks, raising a wary eyebrow at her.

“We don’t have any neighbors in this docking bay, right?” Sabine asks.

“Right,” Hera says. They _really_ lucked out with this docking bay: A rebel sympathizer is letting them dock for free in a private bay, with a retractable roof that Hera can open or close at will, to protect the _Ghost_ from the rain, and from being detected by passing Imperial aerial patrols. There are several rebel ships from Phoenix Squadron spread out all over Garel right now, but Hera thinks, secretly, that she’s got the best end of the deal. She certainly feels more secure in here than she would in an open, public docking bay in Garel City Spaceport, and she’s saving on daily rent.

“So can we play outside?” Sabine’s asking.

“Can we what?” Hera says.

“Like, soccer?” Sabine clarifies.

Ahsoka’s face lights up. “Did Rex tell you how _good_ he and I used to be, in two-on-two?” she says.

“Maybe,” Sabine says with a knowing smile. “But my brother and I used to be really good, too.”

“What about these guys?” Ahsoka says, teasingly, glancing over at Ezra and Zeb.

“I’m okay,” Zeb says, and he reaches over and punches her on the shoulder. “Twenty,” he says.

“I’m a quick study,” Ezra says. He leans over and punches Ahsoka’s other shoulder. “Twenty-one,” he says, and Ahsoka rolls her eyes, bats his hand away.

“Rexter?” she asks. “You still think we’re good at two-on-two?”

Rex laughs. “Oh, I don’t know,” he says. “As good as an old man and an old woman can be.” He leans over, punches her lightly on the thigh. “Twenty-two.”

“Hera didn’t say yes yet,” Sabine says, glancing at Hera.

“Like I had a choice,” Hera says, rolling her eyes but smiling; Sabine smiles in return. “Yes, yes, go, go on, get out of here.”

“Three-on-two,” Ahsoka says, leaning forward with a competitive glint in her eye. “We’ll _still_ win.” She wags at finger at Ezra across the table. “And _no_ cheating,” she says. “Neither of us is allowed to use the Force.”

“Says who?” Ezra asks.

“House rules,” Rex replies, and Ezra shrugs.

“Fine. There’s some crates in the cargo hold we can set up goals with,” Ezra says, and everyone’s getting up from the table, making for the hold, lowering the ramp. Ahsoka gets Ezra to help her move all the crates, testing his abilities with Force lifting, and Sabine digs the soccer ball out from the storage closet in the common room, and the game starts, Chopper hovering right at the edge of the playing area, a self-appointed referee.

Kanan and Hera hang back, sitting together halfway down the lowered ramp of the _Ghost_ with their knees pulled to their chests and their hands flat behind them on the ramp, watching the game, Kanan’s interest more avid than Hera’s at the moment, despite Hera’s usually competitive nature. It’s nice just to _be_ , to sit here with her hand three inches from Kanan’s, their hips nearly touching, the sound of the rain pinging down on the metal roof of the docking bay mingled with the shouts of laughter and the huff of breath coming from the soccer players.

“This is nice,” she says quietly, sliding her hand over, closing the distance between hers and Kanan’s, the side of her fingers brushing against the side of his.

“Yeah,” he agrees, moving his fingers against hers thoughtfully, glancing over at her with a smile before turning his attention back to the game. “Nice to see everyone so happy,” he says.

“Yeah,” Hera says, looking at him for a moment longer before she turns her attention back to the game, too.

Ahsoka and Rex _are_ good, Hera muses as she watches them play. Even after all these years, they move as though they’re anticipating the other’s move, passing the ball easily. But Ezra and Sabine and Zeb are making a good team, too, and the game’s intense, though friendly.

The game eventually ends with a narrow victory going to Ahsoka and Rex. Rex jogs over and flops down at the foot of the ramp, in front of Hera and Kanan’s feet, huffing for breath. Ahsoka and Ezra and Sabine and Zeb are still out there in the middle of the docking bay, Ahsoka and Ezra taking up an impromptu Jedi practice, having Zeb and Sabine throw the ball, the two of them catching and deflecting and passing it using the Force.

“I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: You’ve got some good kids,” Rex pronounces, wiping sweat from his brow, glancing up at Hera and Kanan. “Raising ‘em well.”

Kanan huffs out a sheepish laugh, and Hera sees color coming into his cheeks. “We do what we can,” Kanan says.

“They’re good crewmates,” Hera says. “And there’s no one else I’d rather have in my family. But I wouldn’t call them _our_ kids. We’re really not old enough.”

Kanan laughs. “Yeah, what is it Sabine always calls us?”

Hera smiles. “We’re the mom and dad _friends_ ,” she says, mocking the way Sabine always puts the emphasis on it.

“That,” Kanan says.

Rex scoffs a little, waves his hand at them. “Ah, that doesn’t matter,” he says. “We’ve _all_ had to grow up too fast. But you all --” There’s a burst of laughter from the docking bay, where Ezra’s been a little _too_ enthusiastic, gotten the soccer ball stuck up into the rafters of the roof, and Ahsoka executes a showy, flippy jump up to get it, landing effortlessly in the rafters, Ezra exclaiming that she’s _gotta_ teach him how to do that --

Rex shakes his head, laughs as he watches Ahsoka jump down, laughing, landing lightly in an even showier cartwheel. “You’ve given them the space they deserve, to be the kids they are,” he says, looking up at Hera and Kanan. “They’re comfortable, cared for, enough that they can _relax_ every so often _._ That’s important. Hells, even _I_ feel relaxed with you all,” he finishes with a toothy grin.

The group on the playing field is arguing, now, about starting a second game. Hera hears the phrase “guys versus girls!” being thrown around.

“Kanan!” Ezra calls, breaking through Hera’s thoughts. “Rex! Zeb and I really need you!”

“Uh, Hera!” Sabine calls in response, glaring goodnaturedly at Ezra. “Ahsoka and I need _you_!”

Kanan reaches for Hera’s hand, squeezes it, cocks his head at her flirtily. “Well?” he asks. “Wanna go play with the kids?”

Hera laughs. “Oh, you’re on,” she says, squeezing his hand back as they get to their feet, go to join the game.

-

Later, after everyone has finished administering Ahsoka’s thirty-two punches, and after everyone has cooled off from the soccer game (which the girls won, thank you very much); after Zeb has served the nerf ribs; after they have presented Ahsoka with the jogan-flavored cake, after Ezra has taught Ahsoka about everything Hera’s taught him about celebrating a birthday -- honoring your ancestors, thanking them for giving hope for the upcoming year -- after Ahsoka has, with the saddest smile, told them a little about Anakin and Obi-Wan; after she’s made her wish and blown out her candle; after everyone has enjoyed a late-night cup of tea together, all of them reluctant to go to bed; and after Hera and Kanan have cleaned up the dishes, they find themselves where they somehow always do: Lingering, watching each other undress and get ready for bed, the door to Hera’s room locked behind them.

Kanan crosses the room, wraps his arms around Hera, stopping her from pulling her pajamas on, from turning the light out. He smooths his hands over her bare shoulders and back, dips his head to press small kisses to her neck, the base of one lek, her cheekbone, her nose.

“This was such a nice day,” he says, his lips moving on her skin. Hera drops her pajamas to the floor, abandoning the idea of putting them on.

“Mm,” she agrees, a hum of pleasure in the back of her throat, floating on how happy and relaxed she’s felt all day, on how much she loves all these people on her ship right now: Kanan and his persistent affection, especially right now, but also Ezra, and his gentle and sweet spirit, Sabine’s sharp, bright, funny intelligence, Zeb’s easy going nature, Chopper’s unfailing loyalty, Rex’s kind wisdom, Ahsoka’s unexpected silliness and laughter, lurking under her ferocity and dedication. “It really was,” Hera says. “You guys were fun.”

“Rex was right,” Kanan says, walking her slowly backwards toward the bed, rubbing the pad of his thumb over the tip of one lek.

“Mm,” Hera hums again, desire flaring to life inside her. “About what, love?” The backs of her legs hit the edge of the bed, and Kanan’s fingers are at the band of her underwear.

“They’re good kids,” Kanan says into the hollow of her throat, sliding her underwear down her hips, down her legs. She steps out of it willingly, pressing her pelvis up into his, looping her arms around his neck, pulling him down against her. “A good family. And, Ezra was right the other day, too.”

“About what?” she asks again, distracted by the feeling of him on her, by the way his knees hit the bed, bracketing her, pinning her in place, by the way he grinds down against her, the way both his hands come to rest on her hips, grounding her. Her eyes slide closed, and she lets herself go to the feeling of his hands on her body, something warm and comforting in his weight on her, in the unhurried way he holds her, his erection pressed between their stomachs but not demanding her attention, not just yet.

“You’re so, so good,” Kanan whispers, punctuating his words with kisses down her left lek, “at teaching people, to hold on to, and to plan for, these small, little, moments, of, hope.”

“Kanan,” Hera says, that warm, sweet, overwhelming feeling from the other day settling into the cavity of her chest once more. He moves his attention to her right lek, now, brushing little kisses down it, mirroring the path he just took down the left. “I barely did anything today,” she says. “Ezra ran the show.”

“But you,” he says, still kissing her between his words, “taught him, to think, like, that.” Kanan tilts his head, kisses her on the mouth, gentle, affectionate, a slow heat in the way he draws her lower lip in between his, the intentional slide of his lips on hers making her press up her hips up into his, a low, contented moan escaping the back of her throat. She reaches up, fumbles for his hair tie, pulls his ponytail free, drags her fingers through his soft hair.

“You taught him to cultivate those moments of hope, and now he’s teaching that to others,” he says, his lips brushing hers, his voice gravelly and rough with the weight of his feelings, his breath warm on her face, one of his hands sliding slowly, thoughtfully, from her hip to the top of her thigh, his fingers leaving a trail of fire behind them. He turns his head back to her lek, kissing down it once more, his loose hair tickling her skin. “Isn't that, how, rebellions, start?”

Hera wants to answer him, wants to tell him how gods-awful it feels to think that, under this Empire, the idea of just slowing down, taking a day to celebrate someone’s birthday, has somehow become this unusual, revolutionary act of hope, but her mind comes to a blessed, screeching halt when Kanan takes the entire tip of her right lek in his mouth, when his fingers start questing over to the meeting of her legs.

-

(Later, after, when Hera’s still floating on the glowy come-down, burrowed into the side of Kanan’s body, Kanan idly running one hand over the curve of her hip, he says, “So, uh.”

She glances up at him, her cheek moving where it rests against his chest, her head rising and falling with his breaths. It’s too soon for her to speak still, but she raises one eyebrow at him.

“How big we planning on letting this family get?” he says, a smile dancing across his face, touching his eyes. His voice vibrates through her, they’re so close.

Hera arches her other eyebrow at him.

“I’m just thinking, if we get too much bigger, we’re gonna need to start a calendar or something,” Kanan quips, and he flashes her a full, crooked, broad grin. “Like, okay, six birthdays, I can keep track of in my mind. But, uh, more than eight? We need some kind of organizing system.”

Hera shoves at him gently, rolls her eyes, shakes her head, huffs out a laugh.

“What do you think?” he’s asking her, but she just snuggles even closer to him, hooks one leg over one of his, settling into him with a contented sigh.)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> the moods for this chapter - whole heart (bkaye remix) by gryffin and bipolar sunshine, and same team by labrinth and stefflon don


	4. 1 BBY

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> is it ever gonna change? am i gonna feel this way forever?  
> are you gonna be around for me to count on, count on
> 
> -
> 
> come what may, i’ll still stay  
> inside your mind, for all of time, singing  
> ooh, we will be alright  
> in the afterlife

**iv. - 1 BBY**

On the afternoon before Ezra’s birthday, Sabine probably thinks she’s losing the argument, even though Hera’s going to say yes anyway.

“Come on, Hera,” Sabine says. “He’s basically an adult now, and _everyone’s_ going to be there. An anti-Empire party on the day before Empire Day? You _have_ to let Ezra come with me, it’ll be a great birthday thing for him.”

“Hmm,” Hera says, pretending to need to consider it.

“Plus, I’m doing the fireworks show with a few of the other weapons techs, Ezra _can’t_ miss it,” Sabine adds.

“You know how seriously we take alcohol in this family,” Hera warns her.

Sabine huffs out a sigh. “I know,” she says. “We’ll be careful. I’ll be with him. And Zeb.”

“What do you think Kanan’s gonna say?” Hera asks her.

Sabine rolls her eyes. “You know he’s gonna say yes if you do, and no if you do,” she says.

Hera smiles. “That’s fair,” she says. She sighs. “Okay, yes, you guys can go to the party and celebrate, just don’t over-do it, okay? We _do_ have an op to run tomorrow, you know, on the actual Empire Day?”

“You’re the best,” Sabine says, sing-song, smiling, and she’s on her feet, off to find Ezra, leaving Hera sitting in the galley with her mission planning and her cup of caf, like she had been before Sabine came to find her.

Kanan walks in five minutes later, sits down on one of the stools in front of the table. Hera lays her datapad down, leans back in the booth. “You did tell Ezra he could go to the party tonight with Sabine, right?” she asks him.

“Yeah,” Kanan says with a nod. “They’ll be fine.”

“I still can’t believe they’re having a party on the night before a major op,” Hera grumbles. “We need to be in good condition to ruin the Empire’s day tomorrow.”

Kanan smiles and shakes his head. “Ah, they’ll be fine,” he says again. “It’ll lift the spirits. Everyone knows they’ve got a job to do, but that doesn’t mean they can’t have their fun, too.”

“You’re right,” Hera admits. She looks at him. “Are you gonna go?” she asks him.

Kanan huffs out a laugh. “Nah,” he says. “Despite my reputation when you first met me, I’m no longer a suave twenty-something who hangs out at parties.”

“Mm, that’s funny,” Hera says. “Neither am I.”

Kanan leans forward, and he lifts his mask from his face, lays it down on the table. He winks at her, very intentionally, very lewdly, and Hera feels heat rise into her cheeks, the base of her lekku. “Well, then, maybe I’ll see you around, General Homebody, while everyone else is out tonight,” he says in his best, flirtiest, lowest voice.

Hera scowls at him, but she laughs, trying to press back the shiver that’s running down her spine at the lack of subtlety in his words, at the seed of anticipation he’s just planted in her mind. It took them so long to get back to something resembling normal after Malachor, but ever since leaving Atollon, ever since Kanan’s been back on Yavin from Mandalore, ever since she decided she didn’t care anymore about holding him at arm’s length under the guise of professionalism or self-preservation, ever since they finally reconnected, they’ve been -- she’s just been _so_ into him, she --

“Yeah, okay, see ya around, Commander Nerfherder,” she jokes.

Kanan smirks at her, straightens up in his seat, picks up his mask, but it doesn’t put it back on just yet. “Where are Sabine and Ezra, anyway?” he asks, the moment over, the mood between them settling.

Hera shrugs. “Getting ready to go out, I guess,” she says. “Sabine’s doing the fireworks tonight, she might be working on that.”

“Of course she is,” Kanan says, shaking his head, smiling fondly. He gets up, takes a couple steps around the side of the table, leans into Hera’s space, his mouth so close to her ear all of a sudden, sending another shiver down her spine. “Maybe I’ll do your fireworks tonight,” he murmurs.

Hera reaches up, laughs, shoves at his upper arm. “Ugh, Kanan, please,” she groans, rolling her eyes at him.

“Oh, with pleasure,” he says, winking at her again as he walks out of the galley.

-

When Sabine and Ezra are about to leave, Hera’s waiting for them at the top of the ramp of the _Ghost_ , looking out over the moons rising in the twilight over Yavin, still running through the details of tomorrow’s op in the back of her mind.

“Hey, Hera,” Ezra says. She turns to look at them: Kanan’s in the middle, not wearing his mask, his right arm around Ezra’s shoulders, his left around Sabine’s.

Hera looks at Ezra a little more closely. “Did Sabine cut your hair?” Hera asks, and Ezra and Sabine both nod.

“Yep,” Sabine says. “Had to get rid of last year, you know how it goes.”

“Yeah,” Hera says. “Well, it looks good.”

“Thanks,” Ezra says.

“You’re really starting the celebration early this year,” Hera observes. “Your haircut _and_ a party, both on the day before your actual birthday? Is this a new thing we’re starting?”

“I don’t know, you’re the one who put the banner up early,” Ezra counters, smiling at her.

“That’s true,” Hera says. She shrugs. She’d done it while finishing up her work this afternoon, something to do with her hands while mentally chewing over the final details of tomorrow’s attack.

Hera props both her hands on her hips, considers the three of them, how _grown_ they all look, even Kanan. “Don’t stay out too late, okay?” Hera reminds them, looking between Sabine and Ezra.

“Okay,” Sabine says, wriggling out from under Kanan’s arm, “we won’t, I promise. Everyone on base knows we’re launching at 1400 tomorrow.”

“Good,” Hera says.

“I gotta go grab a couple things,” Sabine says. “Meet you there, okay, Ezra? Zeb’s gonna meet us there, too.”

“Okay,” Ezra says, leaning a little more into Kanan now that Sabine’s moved away. “Hey, where is Zeb, anyway?” Ezra asks.

Sabine smirks. “With Kallus,” she says. Ezra rolls his eyes.

“Bye!” Sabine calls, waving at Hera and Kanan as she bounds away down the ramp. “Don’t forget to watch our fireworks!”

“We won’t,” Hera says.

Hera turns, looks back at Ezra and Kanan, who are still just standing there a few steps behind her at the top of the ramp of the _Ghost_ , Ezra leaning his head heavily against Kanan’s shoulder, the top of his short hair barely brushing against Kanan’s jaw, reminding her of a contented loth-cat.

“Stars, you’ve gotten so tall, Ezra,” Hera says, still having a hard time believing, sometimes, that he’s the same kid that Kanan found in the street on Lothal. “You’re almost as tall as Kanan, now.”

“Hera,” Ezra says, straightening up to his full height. “My growth spurt was last year. I’ve been tall for, uh, awhile now?”

Hera laughs at him, at his confidence, at the way Kanan’s smiling but rolling his milky eyes.

“Yeah,” Hera says, “but you’re even taller now than you were last year. Trust me,” she says. “I remember what last year was like.”

Kanan and Ezra frown in tandem.

(Last year on Ezra’s birthday, Kanan had been in the depths of his depression and pain after Malachor, and so had Ezra, Hera now knows in retrospect, though it had manifested so differently in the two of them. Kanan hadn’t been able to get out of bed or do anything for Ezra’s birthday, even though Hera had begged him to try -- he’d just turned away from her, stayed in his room with the door closed, blinded and in pain and so disconnected from the rest of them, like he had been for weeks already. Ezra, for his part, had tried to call the whole thing off the night before, had announced at dinner that he would refuse to celebrate his birthday, and he’d stormed away from the table, disappearing into his own room.

That had hurt, maybe even more than Kanan’s despondent rejection had, especially since Hera knew that Ezra loved celebrating birthdays on the _Ghost_ , with their family _._ So she’d tried: She’d followed him, knocking on his door, saying, “Ezra, love, please. Talk to me.”

But when Hera had finally gone in there, Ezra had fallen bitterly apart, his eyes stony and dry, the sobs all stuck in his lungs, unwilling to express themselves as grief that Hera could understand, manifesting themselves instead in hateful, angry words, in what Hera now knows was the grip of the Dark side of the Force. Ezra had said horrible things to her that night -- that he should’ve died instead of Ahsoka, that he was the reason Kanan was blind, that he hated himself, that he knew Kanan hated him, that he hated Kanan -- terrible, awful things, things that had made Hera need to go to her own room and lock her own door and cry real tears.

Hera had hung up her mom’s banner in the galley anyway, had gotten some fruit anyway, and Zeb and Sabine had tried to find Ezra, to punch him seventeen times, had tried to get him to go out with them on a walk, but Ezra had made good on his word, had kept the door of the room locked, forcing Zeb out for the day. At the end of the day, Hera and Zeb and Sabine and Chopper and Rex had found themselves sitting alone in the galley, quietly slicing and eating the fruit with their tea, toasting the Bridgers because Ezra wouldn’t, toasting Ahsoka because it felt like the right thing to do, despite how sad, how _wrong_ it felt, wishing that the upcoming year would just, please, by all the spirits and small goddesses, bring _healing_.

It had been one of the worst birthdays Hera had ever experienced.

This year, everything’s different, and Hera couldn’t be more thankful for that.)

But maybe mentioning last year was a bad move, she thinks, looking at the way both Ezra and Kanan’s faces have fallen.

“Hey,” Hera says. Both of their gazes flick to her. She takes a couple steps forward, closes the distance between them, lays her right hand on Kanan’s left elbow and her left hand on Ezra’s right elbow. “I’m so glad we’re all here, together, this year,” she says, really meaning it, the memories of the past year punching through her.

“Me too,” Ezra says.

“Yeah, me too,” Kanan agrees.

“Have fun tonight, Ezra, okay?” Hera says, rubbing her hand over his elbow. “Happy early birthday.”

“Okay, we will,” Ezra says. “Thanks, Hera.”

Kanan reaches up, cups the right side of Ezra’s head in his right hand, pulls Ezra’s head close, turns his own head, kisses the left side of Ezra’s temple. “Happy birthday, kiddo,” Kanan says.

Ezra turns in his hold, Hera’s hand falling away from him, quickly wraps both his arms around Kanan’s middle, leaning into him, Kanan’s hand still on the side of his head, Kanan’s fingers scratching through Ezra’s hair. “Thanks,” Ezra whispers, so soft Hera almost doesn’t catch it.

Ezra pulls back from the hug and heads off down the ramp. Hera sighs, watches him go for a couple seconds before she goes to Kanan’s side, sliding her right arm behind his back. Kanan lays his left arm around her shoulders, and she leans the side of her head against his chest, silent for a long moment.

“Last year,” Kanan starts softly. “I’m sorry.”

“I know,” Hera says, shaking her head, not wanting to talk about it, not wanting to rehash it. They’ve all moved beyond it, together; she and Kanan have made their peace, said their apologies. “It’s okay,” she says. “I’m just, I’m so glad we’re together again, now.”

“Yeah,” Kanan says. “Me too.”

Hera sighs again. “The older they get, the more we’re gonna have to watch them leave, aren’t we?” she asks.

“Yeah,” Kanan says again, his hold on her shoulders tightening, pulling her a little closer. “We are.” He turns his head and presses a kiss to her forehead, much like he did to Ezra’s a moment ago. “So,” he says, a renewed levity creeping into his voice. “Where are we gonna watch Sabine’s fireworks?”

Hera smiles. “You wanna get on the roof?” she asks.

“Hm,” Kanan hums thoughtfully. “Sure. And then, maybe, in the _Phantom_?” he asks suggestively.

“Maybe, yeah,” Hera breathes, that seed of anticipation he planted in the back of her mind earlier this afternoon shooting sudden, fierce roots down into her stomach. There are probably a thousand other things she could, or should, do with her free time tonight, but the solid feeling of Kanan's body, a few quiet hours alone, is too tempting. “Sounds like a perfect night.”

“I’m glad we agree,” Kanan says.

-

“Damn, love,” Hera’s sighing, a few hours later, as she reclines against Kanan’s shoulder, the both of them nestled up close in the quilt he’d pulled off her bed and dragged up into the _Phantom_. Sabine’s fireworks were beautiful, to be sure, but Kanan had made even more fireworks happen, once they’d climbed off of the roof of the _Ghost_ and into the _Phantom_ , the sparks of pleasure in the slow, methodical way he’d touched her exploding along her skin and behind her eyelids until she’d felt like she couldn’t move.

Kanan smirks, like he’s never been more pleased with himself, but he pushes himself up to sitting, untangles himself from her, smooths his hair back into its ponytail, starts fixing his clothes. “Kids’ll be back soon,” he says.

Hera sighs at the thought of having to emerge from this cocoon, but she sits up, too, stretches her arms over her head, starts fixing her own clothes, pulling her cap and boots on. “Should we let them think we just sat out there on the roof all night?” she asks.

“They’ll never believe it, but sure,” he says, and they gather themselves up, climb back out of the _Phantom_ and onto the roof of the _Ghost._ The humidity is thick over Yavin, but the night is clear and cloudless, and Hera settles down next to Kanan, his arm around her, her head on his shoulder, and she tilts her head up, looking at the stars.

She very nearly falls asleep like that, but jovial voices in the distance break through her relaxed, meditative state: Ezra and Sabine, laughing and teasing each other as they walk back from the party. She sits up a little, looks out over the tarmac, sees them approaching the ship, their strides perfectly in sync. Trailing several paces behind them is Zeb, and he’s --

Hera elbows Kanan in the side. “Zeb and Kallus are totally holding hands,” she says.

“I know,” Kanan says.

“You _know_?” Hera says. She glances back down. “I don’t know how to feel about that,” she admits. Happy, she wants to feel happy for Zeb, and Kallus’s loyalty to the Rebellion is never something she’d question. All of the old, buried hurts and complicated, thorny politics between Zeb’s people and the Empire, Kallus’s legacy of involvement there, the _problems_ \-- those things, and the fear of one of her oldest friends getting hurt, are what give her such grave pause.

Kanan shrugs. “They’ll figure it out,” he says. “I wouldn’t worry about it.”

Hera frowns.

Ezra and Sabine are close enough now that Hera can hear their conversation:

“You are _so_ into him, don’t lie,” Sabine’s saying.

“It’s not a big deal!” Ezra says. “I just think he’s cute, okay?”

“But you were _also_ dancing with that girl from Green Squadron!” Sabine exclaims.

“Who said I’m not allowed to like both girls and guys?” Ezra says.

“No one,” Sabine says.

“Then why do you care?” Ezra asks.

“You’re just such a _flirt_ ,” Sabine says.

“So what?” Ezra says. “It’s not like you don’t flirt with every cute girl you see.”

“Ezra!” Sabine says.

“Oh,” Ezra says, laughing, “Sorry, I meant every dangerous and scary-looking girl!”

Hera looks at Kanan. “He is _so_ your kid,” she says. He nods.

“Nothing wrong with that,” Kanan says.

Before Hera can tell him anything different, Kanan calls out, “Hey, guys,” and he waves down to Sabine and Ezra as they near the _Ghost_.

“You guys did _not_ sit up there all night,” Sabine yells up at them.

“So?” Kanan asks. “What if we did, and what if we didn’t?” Sabine makes an audible _ugh_ sound up at him -- Hera can practically hear her rolling her eyes -- but Kanan just smiles, chuckles a little. He leans over, brushes a final kiss to the side of Hera’s forehead, and then gathers himself up, energy coiling nearly palpably in his body where he’s sitting next to her. Before she knows it, he’s leaping off the roof of the ship, landing lightly on his feet below him.

“Show-off,” Ezra teases.

“You’re one to talk,” Sabine says.

Kanan captures Ezra back under his right arm and Sabine back under his left, walking them into the ship, just like he walked them out, hours ago. “You guys have fun? I heard your fireworks were a big hit,” Hera can hear him saying as they enter the _Ghost_ , as their steps fade.

Zeb and Kallus have paused, a few paces away from the ship, talking quietly, their bodies angled in toward one another, and Hera sighs, shrugs at all of her misgivings about _that_ , starts to climb down from the roof, decides that they’ll figure it out, that she’ll wait and see what happens. She has more important things to worry about, like getting some rest before tomorrow’s mission.

-

The op goes off without a hitch the next afternoon, some combination of Hera’s worry and her careful, strategic planning paying off, and the mood on the tarmac is mostly jubilant as everyone lands. There were a couple of casualties in Phoenix Squadron, but fewer than Hera had projected, and fewer than other squadrons experienced. Though nearly all craft in the squadron took damage, almost everyone managed to hold it together, to make it back home, if not in one piece, at least alive, and that’s something. Overall, it feels like a success, albeit a hard-earned one, feels like they _definitely_ rained a little on the Empire’s Empire Day parade, multiple squadrons hitting small targets across the galaxy. Smaller, maybe, than Hera would’ve liked, and not without some setbacks, especially in terms of damage, but success, nonetheless.

Everyone’s wired after the mission, keyed up, and Hera wishes they could just celebrate Ezra’s birthday properly, that their family could get away from the bustle of the war and go out on a hike, go find this waterfall one of her maintenance techs told her about the other day, but duty calls.

Almost as soon as the _Ghost_ was on solid ground, Hera had gotten dragged into a long debrief with the other generals and commanders, leaving a quick laundry list of repairs and diagnostics with Sabine and Ezra and Zeb and Chopper, work that needed to get done on the _Ghost_ and the _Phantom_ and several other ships in the squadron.

“Sorry to leave you with chores on your birthday,” she’d said to Ezra, squeezing his shoulder before heading into the briefing.

“It’s okay,” Ezra had said. “Like you said yesterday. We’re all here, together. That’s enough for me.”

“Very mature,” Hera had said.

“Hera,” Ezra had said, and she’d tilted her head at him. “I’ve been having those -- those visions, about Lothal, again,” he’d said.

Hera had frowned. “I thought Kanan said you guys were gonna figure that out.”

“Yeah,” Ezra had said, “we are. But --” he’d bounced on the balls of his feet, bitten his bottom lip. “Can you _please_ let me know if it comes up in the briefing, at _all_? We _promised_ Ryder.”

Hera had sighed. “I know we did,” she’d said, turning and heading for the briefing room.

Three hours later and Hera’s _finally_ walking out of the meeting, exhausted, a headache built up behind her eyes from concentrating so intensely for so long. She walks across the tarmac, and Chopper rolls up to meet her, blatting at her about a busted coolant coil in the _Phantom_ that needs replaced.

Hera pinches the bridge of her nose between her thumb and forefinger. “Put it on the list for the next supply run, okay?” she asks him, and he rolls away, grumbling to himself about how she needs to get her priorities in line.

“Hey, Hera!” Sabine’s calling to her, from across the tarmac. Hera sighs. She just wants to take a shower and go over the damage reports, doesn’t want to know what kind of problem Sabine has waiting for her. Hera looks over in the direction of her voice. Sabine’s sitting on one wing of a damaged Y-wing, her feet dangling over the side, Zeb and Ezra perched on the other wing. Sabine waves, beckoning her over.

“What’s the problem?” Hera asks, when she’s close enough that she doesn’t have to shout.

Sabine grins. “No problem, just something we need you to do real quick,” she says. Ezra’s rolling his eyes dramatically and groaning _ugh_ in the back of his throat.

Zeb grabs Ezra around the shoulders, cuffs the back of his head. “That’s seventeen,” Zeb says, and he glances down at her. “Hera, would you do the honors?” he asks.

Hera smiles, shakes her head, laughs, “Sure.” There’s a wheeled service ladder near the wing that Ezra and Zeb are sitting on, and she climbs it, reaching over the edge to where Zeb’s still holding Ezra in place. Hera gently punches Ezra on the shoulder.

“Happy eighteenth birthday, Ezra,” she says, and the three of them smile at her as she climbs back down the ladder, heads back toward the _Ghost._ “Now get those diagnostics done, please!” she calls over her shoulder.

“Okay!” they all answer, in unison.

-

Finally, it’s evening, and they’re all tired, and they could all use a shower and some rest, but they all collapse in the booth in the galley together, anyway. Kanan realized, while they were all out working, that no one had really eaten any dinner, and he’d made a batch of pancakes speckled with jogan slices, scrambled some cheesy eggs on the side, which had brightened everyone’s spirits immensely once they’d come inside.

“Mm, breakfast for dinner,” Ezra says, picking up his fork. “Nothing better. Thanks, Kanan.”

“Wait, hold on, one sec,” Sabine says. She gets up, digs in the galley junk drawer, finds a single birthday candle, brings it back over to the table, jams it down into Ezra’s stack of pancakes.

Ezra sighs. “I’m _hungry_ ,” he whines.

“It’s your _birthday_ ,” Sabine says.

Ezra sighs again, but it’s a centering sigh, his eyes drifting closed, and when he opens them, his face is clear, calmer. “We honor those who came before us, and we thank them, for giving us life, and for giving us a reason to keep fighting,” Ezra recites. “My mom, my dad, and --” he looks around the table -- “everyone you guys always honor, they’re all my ancestors, too. Everyone the Empire has killed for no reason. We’re all connected.” He sighs.

Chopper extends his little flamethrower tool, as always, and lights the candle on Ezra’s pancakes. “We wish that we can use the upcoming year to continue to honor them, and to continue to improve ourselves,” Ezra continues. He stares into the flame of the candle contemplatively. “I wish that we can use the upcoming year to free Lothal, and to free other worlds, too,” Ezra says. “I wish for _hope_ ,” he finishes, and he dips his head, blows the candle out.

Everyone claps, wishes him a happy birthday, and Ezra pulls the candle out of his pancakes, digs in, says, muffled around his first bite, “Thanks, Kanan.”

Later, when everyone is finally winding down, taking turns in the fresher, getting ready to go to bed, Hera hears Kanan and Ezra talking in the hall. “There’s something I think I need to talk to you about,” Kanan’s saying, soft, serious. “But I know we’re all exhausted. Get up and go on a run with me tomorrow?”

“Yeah, sure,” Ezra says.

-

The sun isn’t anywhere close to up yet when Kanan stirs out of bed the next morning, his movement waking Hera up. She lays in bed, watches as he pulls on his lighter layers, the stretchy pants he always runs in. “I need to spend some time with Ezra today,” he says, out the door before she can respond.

She could stay in bed longer, but she thinks about how much didn’t get done off her admittedly over-ambitious list yesterday, and she sighs, gets up, gets dressed, makes herself a cup of caf, reads over the list on her datapad while she’s waiting for the water to boil. She’s not ready to look at a screen for very long yet, so working on her after-action report is out for now, and she needs more time to wake up before she can dive into detailed, delicate parts work. She skims the list, looking for something boring but useful, something she can put her hands on autopilot for, to give her brain a little extra time.

“Scrub the ion scoring off the side of the _Phantom_ ” hasn’t been checked off yet, and she’s not surprised -- it’s one of the kids’ least favorite chores, because it’s so boring, so monotonous, and so predictable, something that has to be done nearly every time the _Phantom_ sees any kind of action.

Just what she needs.

Sipping her caf, Hera digs around in the cabinet of cleaning supplies for a fresh scour pad and the can of anti-rust sealant. She puts on her sturdier pair of work gloves, tucks her flight gloves into a pocket of her coveralls, and she heads outside, pausing for a moment, taking in the peaceful pre-dawn haze that hangs over the base. There are a couple of beings up and stirring around the tarmac already, mostly exercising or working on ships, but everything feels stiller, calmer, than usual. Hera can hear the native birds and bugs singing, can see the faint, glowy suggestion of light where the sun will rise over the ancient temple in a little while, maybe an hour from now. There’s just enough natural light showing that she doesn’t feel like she needs a headlamp. She could probably do this chore in her sleep, anyway.

Hera sets her cleaning supplies on the ground, goes back inside, climbs the ladder into the _Phantom_ , undocking it from the _Ghost_ , setting it easily down on the tarmac on the _Ghost_ ’s port side. She gets out and gets to work, her mind drifting as she scrubs and seals, pausing every so often to sip her caf.

Mostly, she’s thinking about Ezra: About his slightly unusual birthday celebrations over the past couple days, about his concern for Lothal, about how grown up he is, about how _good_ he’s been for all of them, every single member of their family, over the past few years, especially for Kanan. Hera’s never seen anything like what Kanan and Ezra have between them, knows there’s no one else in the galaxy -- not even herself -- that Kanan loves more, and she loves it, loves that she gets to be a part of this almost magical bond between them, loves that she’s gotten the privilege of watching them both grow up, in different ways, together, over these years.

Speak of the devils. Their voices cut through her thoughts, both of them panting for breath as though they’ve just run five miles, and, okay, the chances that they _have_ just run five miles are actually pretty high.

She knows they have to know she’s out here, have to feel her nearby, but she can’t see them as they pause on the other side of the _Ghost._

“Good pace,” Kanan’s saying to Ezra. “Especially on those hills.”

“What did you wanna talk about?” Ezra asks.

“Let’s run our forms first,” Kanan says, the sound of his saber humming to life unmistakable. “Clear your mind.”

Hera keeps scrubbing the hull of the _Phantom_ , listening to them spar, Kanan occasionally making a correction or a suggestion, one or the other of them occasionally laughing, their breaths in sync, their sabers crackling as they meet.

Half an hour later, the sun has started to touch the edges of the tarmac, one side of the _Phantom_ is totally clean and glimmering in the strengthening light, and Ezra’s saying, “ _Now_ will you tell me what you wanted to talk about?”

Hera smiles at the impatience in his voice, at the way she can imagine Kanan raising an eyebrow at him as he says, “Is your mind clear?”

“As clear as it’s gonna get,” Ezra says.

“Okay,” Kanan says. They fall quiet, and Hera’s curious, drops to her knees, peeking under the _Ghost_ at them as she scrubs the other side of the _Phantom_ , the side closer to the _Ghost_. They’ve both settled, facing one another in that familiar, meditative pose, so close to each other that their knees are touching. Kanan’s hands are open on his thighs; Ezra holds his in a loose mudra, watching Kanan expectantly.

Hera hears Kanan sigh as she turns her attention back to the _Phantom._ “I wanna show you something,” Kanan says.

“Oh,” Ezra says. “Like, how you taught me to share your memory that one time?”

“Yeah,” Kanan says. “Just like that. Find your center. Clear your mind.”

A few long, quiet minutes pass.

“Now,” Kanan says, slow, deliberate. “I think -- I think it’s time I showed you -- everything.”

Hera turns to look at them under the belly of the _Ghost_ again, the heaviness in Kanan’s tone an unexpected thing. Kanan’s taking one of Ezra’s hands, guiding it up to his temple, and he’s laying one of his hands on Ezra’s. “Easy,” Kanan says.

Hera’s transfixed by the sight of them, by the currents of energy she can imagine flowing between them, something powerful and mystical in their pose. Ezra _gasps_ , and both of them bow their heads a little deeper, tighten their grip on one another, their foreheads nearly touching. Something about it feels private, almost sacred, and Hera turns away, turns her attention back to the _Phantom_ , aware of the sun rising around her, of the base waking up finally, of Kanan and Ezra’s silence behind her.

Finally, when the _Phantom_ ’s almost totally clean and Hera’s starting to get a little concerned about the guys, Ezra breaks the silence.

“Kanan,” he says, his voice is breaking. Hera realizes with a jolt that he sounds like he’s crying, and it startles her, something else she didn’t expect to hear this morning. She turns and looks at them again. Both of Ezra’s hands are on Kanan’s face, his fingertips resting on the edges of the scar over the bridge of Kanan’s nose and cheekbones; one of Kanan’s hands is on Ezra’s shoulder and his other is resting on Ezra’s cheek, cupping his jaw.

“I know,” Kanan says. “I know, I’m sorry, I’m --”

“It’s just -- so _much_ ,” Ezra cut in. “So much you didn’t deserve. So much to -- to know.”

“I know,” Kanan says again. “I’m sorry to ask you to -- I’ve just -- I’ve been having this feeling,” he says, heavy, sad.

“What feeling?” Ezra asks, gasping in a sobbing breath, and Kanan runs his thumb over Ezra’s cheek, wiping away his tears. “Is this, like, like what we were talking about the other day? Like the vision we --”

Kanan sighs. “Yeah,” he says. “It’s about that, I guess. I’ve been having this feeling like -- like you’re gonna need to know, to tell someone, someone I’m afraid I won’t be there to tell.”

“Kanan,” Ezra says again, and he sounds scared, sounds more scared than Hera’s heard him sound in a long time.

“Come here, kiddo,” Kanan says, pulling Ezra closer, both of them holding each other, Kanan’s arms around Ezra’s shoulders, Ezra’s arms around Kanan’s middle. “I don’t know what’s gonna happen,” he says. “But I know that I love you.”

“I love you too, Kanan,” Ezra sobs, his voice muffled from where he's tucked his face into the crook of Kanan's neck.

“Easy, now,” Kanan soothes, rubbing his back, rocking him a little. “We’ll figure it out,” he says, and Hera wants to know what’s _scaring_ Ezra so much, what just passed between them, but, at the same time, she almost wishes she didn’t know anything about it at all.

-

That night, he’s late, late coming to bed, and she’s tired, and she finally gives up, puts on her pajamas and gets into bed without him. She’s nearly asleep when she hears footsteps in the hall, accompanied by the rumble of low, male voices.

They’re right outside the door to her room, close enough that the door actually slides open, Kanan’s silhouette strong in the low light of the hall, their quiet conversation drifting to her through the open door.

“But don’t you always say we shouldn’t act out of our emotions?” Ezra’s asking.

“Yeah,” Kanan says. “We shouldn’t, and, if we were perfect all the time, we wouldn’t. We’d just feel what we feel, let those feelings go.”

“But we aren’t perfect,” Ezra concludes seriously, and Kanan laughs, short and affectionate, his head tipping back.

“You’re right about that,” he says. “We definitely are not perfect.”

Kanan sighs. “I’m sorry to have asked you to do it, especially after -- the other week, but -- thank you, Ezra, for holding this with me,” he says, soft, serious. Ezra doesn’t say anything, just leans forward into Kanan, his arms looping around him, changing the way Kanan’s silhouette looks in the doorway. He looks, now, to her, almost like something that’s been suddenly, strangely, completed.

“Get some rest, okay, kiddo,” Kanan finally says, running his hands over Ezra’s head and back, and Ezra sighs, pulls away.

“Night,” Ezra says, and Kanan turns, the door sliding shut behind him, plunging the room back into darkness. Hera can hear him, the rustle of cloth that accompanies him taking off his boots and his clothes, and he climbs carefully and quietly into bed, trying not to jostle her.

“Hey, love,” she says, her voice rough with drowsiness.

“Ah, sorry to wake you,” Kanan murmurs, getting comfortable beside her in bed. He pulls her close, her back against his warm chest, his head bowed low, his forehead pressed gently against her shoulder blades, their hips slotted together, one of his arms heavy over the curve of her waist, the other relaxed between their bodies.

They’re quiet for a few moments, Kanan’s breathing slowing down. Hera’s thinking about asking him, before he falls asleep, about, well, everything -- has been thinking about asking him all day, but hasn’t had the chance, til now, both Kanan and Ezra unusually quiet, avoiding everyone but each other -- but before she can say anything, Kanan breaks the silence between them.

“Hera,” he starts, sounding unsure. “This morning, I -- I asked Ezra to help me carry some things, some memories, from my life,” he tells her, his voice feeling bigger, and heavier, somehow, than it usually does. “I don’t -- I don’t know how to explain it. Maybe -- maybe I shouldn’t have done it.” He sighs, his breath warming her back. “But I -- I don’t know if -- “ He shakes his head, his beard rasping against the skin of her back that’s exposed around the straps of her tank top. “I just want you to know,” he says.

“Kanan, what --” she starts, but he’s shaking his head against her still, pulling her a little more tightly to him.

“I just want you to know, just in case,” he says again, moving his head a little, pressing his lips to the back of her neck. “He -- he has me, my life, our memories, our hopes. Protected in his own memory, now.”

“Why?” Hera asks, feeling herself getting upset, something constricting the inside of her ribcage, something nameless and ugly.

“Because I love him, and I trust him,” Kanan says.

“Kanan,” she says, thinking about the nightmare she had, the other week, the way it upset both of them so profoundly. “Is this about -- about that, that dream, or, or vision, or --”

He sighs, a huff of frustration that puffs over her skin. “I don’t know,” he says. “I genuinely don’t know. It’s just -- a feeling.” He’s running his hand up and down the side of her ribs, something soothing in his tone and in his touch that, somehow, makes Hera feel even more uneasy. “Just -- a feeling.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> the moods for this chapter - 4ever by clario, and dog years by maggie rogers


	5. 0 BBY

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sorrow says, “believe me, you can walk into my mouth,”  
> but every time we have, it’s hard to leave  
> let’s say it like the sunrise when it’s talking to the fog  
> we’re both looking for a light in the window of a house  
> beneath our winter branches, underneath our winter clothes  
> but it’s hard to find
> 
> -
> 
> when friday night  
> finally comes, i’ll leave my troubles at the door  
> and all our friends, they pile in, we sit for supper on the floor  
> why would i ever ask for more  
> some folks have it better  
> but, oh, we’ve got it good

**v. - 0 BBY**

The night before Hera’s birthday, she wakes up to the feeling of a shuttle docking, the sound of loud, heavy footsteps in the hall, raised voices.

“Now that we’re back,” a voice is saying, “I’m officially calling you a kriffing idiot.” Kallus, exasperated, urgent.

“And _I_ still don’t _care_ ,” another voice says. “I’m not an idiot for defending my _family_.” That’s Zeb, emotion heavy in his tone -- anger, frustration, sadness, his voice slurring more than usual, his accent thicker.

Hera sighs, rolls her eyes, turns over in bed, flops onto her back, pulling her lekku out from under her shoulders. She’s about six months along, now, her abdomen getting large and uncomfortable, everything feeling squished and stretched, like she’s running out of room.

“We can argue about this _after_ you’re not bleeding everywhere,” Kallus says, and he sounds pinched, stressed, and Hera can hear the sound of his steps quick in the hall, back and forth between the fresher and the galley. “Sit down and hold this in place,” he says.

It’s so quiet on the _Ghost_ , no beings aboard right now other than Hera and Zeb and Kallus, not even Chopper, off on a mission with Sabine; not even Rex, off on a mission from Command. Hera had a difficult time falling asleep tonight, earlier, when Zeb and Kallus were gone, with how loud the silence was around her. In the mid-night stillness now, it’s like there are no walls on the ship at all; she can hear almost every word that passes between the two of them, echoing in the emptiness.

“‘S not that bad,” Zeb’s arguing.

“Just sit down,” Kallus says.

Hera can hear the sound of things rustling around in the galley, drawers and cabinets being opened and closed. “The one to your left,” Zeb says.

“Give me that,” Kallus says, and there’s a moment of silence. “Hold still,” Kallus says, overlapping with the sound of Zeb drawing in a sharp breath, a hiss of pain.

“Ouch,” Zeb says. “That _hurts_.”

“So hold _still_ ,” Kallus says again, more insistent. “I can’t stop the bleeding if you keep moving.”

“I’m _trying_ ,” Zeb growls, and Kallus responds with an unhappy sound in the back of his throat. There’s silence between them for a moment.

“I wish you’d’ve let me take you to medical,” Kallus finally says.

“It’s not that bad,” Zeb says again.

“You really need a few stitches,” Kallus replies.

“Oh, come on,” Zeb says. “It was just a fistfight.”

“You got _stabbed_ ,” Kallus says, his words coming out clipped, angry.

Hera sighs again, pinches the bridge of her nose between her thumb and forefinger, looks up at the ceiling, debating whether or not to go out there. She should, she really should go out there, but she isn’t sure if she wants to deal with this right now, and she thinks -- hopes -- Kallus is capable of handling it. He’s become, whether Hera meant for him to or not, a part of the family, over the past few months, his relentless and gentle devotion to Zeb something unexpected but not necessarily unwelcome, despite Hera’s lingering reservations about them even being together -- whatever that means -- in the first place.

He can handle this.

Hera covers her face with one hand, her abdomen with her other. The baby’s kicking again, moving restlessly, and she’s already worrying that this kid is Force-sensitive, because their movement always seems the most intense when she’s in a bad mood, when she’s feeling a sudden swoop of negative emotions, which is too often, these days. She tries not to be upset, tells herself Zeb will be fine, rubs her hand over the spot where the baby’s kicking, trying to ask them, somehow, to calm down, to stop assaulting her inner organs like that.

“‘S not _my_ fault that asshole decided to bring a knife to a fistfight,” Zeb grumbles.

“It _is_ your fault for reacting to him and starting the fight in the first place,” Kallus tells him.

“Well, he and his friends should have thought twice before talking shit about my family right in front of me!” Zeb exclaims, his voice rising in pitch, in anger.

“They were trying to bait you,” Kallus says matter of factly. “Could you hold _still_ ,” he adds, his tone dipping into worry. “This wound is deeper than you think it is.”

“So stitch it up yourself if you’re so worried about it,” Zeb grumbles.

“You’re not serious,” Kallus says.

“Sure I am,” Zeb says. “I think we’ve got the stuff for it.”

“And you’re sure I can’t take you to medical?” Kallus asks.

“Positive,” Zeb says. “The last thing I need is to get written up for this when _they_ started it,” he grumbles. “Insulting Hera right in front of me like that. What in the nine hells did they think was going to happen.”

“You didn’t have to _take_ the bait, you know,” Kallus says, and Hera hears them both sigh.

Hera bites her lip. She’s heard the rumors, but she’s tried to ignore them, carry on with her life. People have always had terrible things to say about Twi’leki women, and there’ve been worse things, said more openly, since she started showing. She should be mad, she should be resentful that even though she’s a General, people are still saying the same things about her that they always say about her people, but she’s been too tired to care, has spent her whole life blocking these things out, for the most part, anyway. Kanan was always more sensitive about assholes making comments in cantinas than she was.

Honestly, she’s been more pissed off by the kind-meaning women telling her she’s carrying a blessing in a crisis, a silver lining to all the strife, than by the assholes talking shit about her. She’s always been able to deal with the stereotypical comments about Twi’leki women, but the idea that carrying her dead partner’s child in the middle of a war is anything even remotely close to a _blessing_ makes her want to laugh and cry and break something, all at once. If she had to choose, she’d choose the shit-talking and judgemental looks over the pitying comments and tender hands hovering too close, every time.

She just didn’t know the shit-talking was getting this bad, especially for Zeb.

“I can go wake Hera up, get her to come in here and write you up herself,” Kallus threatens, but there’s no heat behind it, and Hera knows he wouldn’t dare.

“No kriffin’ thanks,” Zeb says, and they both laugh a little.

“This is going to hurt,” Kallus says, all business again, low, serious.

“I trust you, love,” Zeb says, and it’s still strange to Hera’s ears to hear that endearment passing between the two of them. She isn’t sure she’ll ever be completely used to it, especially the way it sounds in Zeb’s mouth, rare, soft, affectionate even in his exasperation, so much like Kanan.

Hera’s mind drifts, lost for a moment, still soothing her hand over the spot where the baby’s kicking, thinking of Kanan, of how different this would all be if he --

She tunes back in when Zeb and Kallus’s voices rise in pitch, arguing again.

“Just take the painkiller,” Kallus is saying.

“I’m fine,” Zeb argues back. “We need to save them for someone who’s really hurt.”

“ _You’re_ really hurt,” Kallus replies.

“Just put the kriffing stitches in already,” Zeb says. “I’ll barely feel it.”

“Are you seriously that drunk?” Kallus asks.

“No,” Zeb says. A moment’s pause, and then he concedes: “Okay, maybe.” Kallus sighs, so loud it’s audible to Hera, the inhale and the exhale distinct and heavy.

“Fine,” Kallus says. “For kriff’s sake, just hold _still_ now,” Kallus says, and there’s silence between them again, a silence that makes Hera hurt all over, thinking of Zeb’s slow lapse back into his problems with alcohol in the months since Kanan and Ezra --

“Alright, that’s one,” Kallus says.

“‘S not the first time I’ve been stitched up on this table, anyway,” Zeb says, his voice tight with pain, and Hera smiles despite herself, knowing the time Zeb’s thinking about.

“I’m sure it’s not,” Kallus says, and his voice sounds softer, far away, somehow, focusing on what he’s doing. “And that’s two. One more, I think, to be safe.”

“When I first came on board,” Zeb starts, “it was after an awful scrape with the Empire, and Kanan --” Zeb gasps, breaks off in the middle of his thought.

“Sorry, love,” Kallus says. “I think three should do you, though. Let me put some bacta on it.”

Zeb’s silent, doesn’t pick his story back up, but Hera can see it in her mind’s eye as though it were yesterday: Kanan, young, bleeding from a cut on his temple, wiping the blood out of his eyes, rolling up his sleeves, both his blood and Zeb’s streaked up his forearms, bending down and stitching a jagged, nasty wound on Zeb’s side closed, frowning furiously, his hands never wavering, quipping, through teeth clenched tight by stress and concentration, “Welcome to the rebellion.”

Hera hasn’t thought about that in forever.

There’s silence in the ship for a long moment, the sound of Kallus ripping open a bacta patch, the sound of the med kit being closed up, replaced in the cabinet.

“Oh, Zeb,” Kallus says, impossibly gentle.

“Kanan,” Zeb chokes out. “Kanan was my brother,” he says miserably, a rush of emotion in his voice, a deluge of grief. “I can’t stand hearing --”

“People are going to talk,” Kallus says evenly. “That’s what they do. I don’t know why you give them the time of day. Acknowledging the rumors, taking their bait -- it’s only going to make it worse. I’m certain Kanan wouldn’t want --”

“Kanan saved me, Alex!” Zeb exclaims, cutting him off. “He was the best thing that happened to me, after -- and I can’t just --” Zeb growls out a frustrated sound, heaves in a broken-sounding breath, and Hera squeezes her eyes shut, tries not to listen.

Zeb’s been so good to her, so protective, so full of false bravado, so _strong_ , and he’s still not let her see his grief head-on, not once, though she’s been hearing it like this the whole time -- how can he possibly think she hasn’t heard? -- snatches of it through closed doors like this for months now, and it hurts her in a strange way, knowing how hard he’s been working to keep it away from her. Part of her wishes he’d be more open with it, that they could work on healing all together, as a family, but another part of her is so tired, and so full of her own grief still, though she’s been working on learning to live with it, that she isn’t sure she’d be the best helper for him, at least not right now, in this moment.

“I know,” Kallus is saying. “I know.”

The way Zeb is breathing is painful to listen to, loud and panicky, not quite crying.

“How can we let people talk shit about Hera and not _do something_?” Zeb asks, his voice cracking.

“You think I’m not doing something?” Kallus responds. “Just because I’m not punching them in the nose?” Kallus sighs. “You need to go to bed,” he says.

“I can’t sleep like this,” Zeb says, quick, between his gasps.

“At least lay down, then,” Kallus says. “Try to rest. You’ve had a lot to drink, and you’ve lost a not inconsiderable amount of blood.” There’s a rustle of movement. “Come on,” Kallus says, and there’s steps in the hall again, coming closer, heading for Zeb’s room, then pausing.

“Will -- will you stay?” Zeb asks, rough. “Or -- are you too mad.”

“I’m not mad at _you_ ,” Kallus says, fond, a little exasperated, and Hera imagines the way he’s probably shaking his head, rolling his eyes. “Anything you need.”

There’s the sound of the door to Zeb’s room opening, but it doesn’t close just yet, and it sounds to Hera like they’re still lingering in the doorway, in the hall.

“What is it?” Kallus asks.

“I just -- some nights I feel like I can’t sleep in here, like this,” Zeb says. “I need to get Sabine to just get rid of this kriffin’ painting.”

“Why would you want to do that?” Kallus asks.

“Because,” Zeb stammers out, and he sucks a breath in, and now Hera’s positive that he’s crying, that that was a sob, and her heart aches a little more.

“Zeb,” Kallus is saying, soft.

“Because I can’t stand looking at Ezra’s face anymore!” Zeb roars, startling Hera with the volume, the intensity, the _pain_ of it. He gasps in another breath. “I miss them so much, Alex, I --”

“I know,” Kallus says, low, gentle, “I know, come here,” and the door slides shut behind them, their voices finally muffled behind it.

-

In the morning, Hera wakes up to the smell of something cooking -- something more unusual than not, these days, with supplies so hard to get. She gets up, gets dressed, passes through the fresher, washes her face, brushes her teeth. She walks into the galley to find Kallus, hanging up the birthday banner, and Zeb, using up the last of the flour and the powdered milk she didn’t realize they still had to make a batch of thin, small pancakes, probably the first hot breakfast they’ve had in months.

“I thought I told you not to do anything,” Hera says, lowering herself into her favorite chair in the corner of the room, wishing, a little, that she could just ignore her birthday, that she didn’t have to think about it, about everything that’s missing today compared to the past ten years.

“Zeb said we had to,” Kallus replies, and Hera smiles, despite herself, shaking her head, watching as Kallus hops down from back of the dejarik booth, double-checking his work, the colors of her home, the banner hand-stitched by her mom, seeming so much brighter than usual, compared to how dim everything feels in Hera’s heart.

“You really didn’t have to,” she counters. “And I think I remember saying I didn’t want you to.”

“But it’s your birthday!” Zeb exclaims. “We _always_ have to do birthdays,” and _stars_ , he looks horrible, Hera realizes as he finally turns around. She can see the bacta patch on his shoulder, where Kallus stitched it up last night, poking out from behind the shoulder strap of his tank, and he’s got an awful black eye, the entire left side of his face badly swollen.

“Garazeb Orrellios,” Hera starts, frowning, getting up, walking over to him, one hand on her hip, the other hovering six inches from his injured shoulder.

“It’s nothing!” Zeb says, and Hera feels her frown deepen.

“You guys weren’t exactly quiet last night,” she says, and Zeb’s face falls.

“Oh,” he says. In the background, Kallus sighs.

Something starts beeping, and Kallus says, “Ah! Look who’s back.” Hera can feel a ship docking with the _Ghost_. She levels a glare at Zeb.

“Lucky timing,” she says to Zeb, “but we really need to talk about this later.”

The ship is docking up top, the familiar jolt of the _Phantom II_ , and Hera smiles despite her frustration.

She smiles, because she hears the sound of the airlocks engaging to one another, and then Sabine is striding into the galley, Chopper close on her heels.

“Sabine,” Hera says, meeting her halfway, holding her arms out for her, and it’s almost like she hadn’t quite realized just how much, how deeply, she’d missed her, this past week, until now.

“Hi, Hera,” Sabine says, rushing to her, hugging her hard. “Stars, I missed you,” Sabine whispers into the crook of Hera’s neck, and Hera feels herself relax into the hug, some nameless fear inside her appeased, for now.

“Missed you too, sweetheart,” Hera says, just as quietly, her hands running over Sabine’s back.

In the months since losing Kanan and Ezra, Hera and Sabine have experienced a mutual realization of how important it is to hug more, to talk more, and they’ve both been trying, been really trying to be a little more expressive with their affections in everyday life. And it’s been easy to do that, together, easier than Hera’d expected.

Sabine has been Hera’s near-constant companion, these months since everything happened on Lothal, and this past week is the longest they’ve spent apart since losing Ezra. Hera doesn’t even want to let herself think about what could have happened, how much it would have hurt, if Sabine somehow hadn’t --

Chopper has rolled up to them, is bumping Hera on her leg, and Hera laughs a little, pulls away from Sabine a little, leans down and lays her hand on Chopper’s dome, forcefully ending that line of thinking, of worrying about Sabine not coming back. “Missed you too, Chop,” she says, and Sabine laughs.

Much to Hera’s surprise, another person slides down the ladder from where the _Phantom_ ’s docked to the _Ghost_.

“Tristan!” Hera says, turning to him, and he grins, nods at everyone, crosses the room.

“Uh, happy birthday, Hera,” Tristan says, and he lets Hera hug him, though not as tightly, or as long, as she hugged Sabine. They’ve only met a handful of times, but Hera had been explicit with him that her family was his family, too, and it’s a pleasant surprise to see him again.

“I didn’t know you were coming,” she says, leaning back, glancing over at Sabine, who has a sly, plotting smile on her face, a smile that never fails to makes Hera just a little nervous, even as it sends a surge of affection running through her.

“Well, I have some business to discuss with the rebellion,” Tristan says -- he’s one of Bo-Katan’s right-hands, these days -- “and I heard you wanted company for your birthday, so.” He shrugs. “I guess the timing all worked out.”

“Hm, you heard I wanted company, huh?” Hera asks him, arching a suspicious eyebrow at Sabine. “I was just telling Zeb and Kallus that I specifically remember asking you guys _not_ to do anything.”

Sabine shrugs. “Since when do we obey your orders?” she asks, too sassy for Hera to deal with this early in the morning. Sabine leans back into Hera, one of her arms around Hera’s waist again. She turns her head, whispers, “I wanted to bring you a full house for your birthday.”

Hera feels something clench her heart at that, turns her head, presses a kiss to Sabine’s temple.

Sabine smiles, pulls away, crosses the galley, wandering over to the electric kettle, turning it on, after a cup of caf.

Zeb is still flipping pancakes out onto a big serving plate, and he turns to pick the plate up, hands it to Kallus, who takes it, sits in the booth, where Tristan is also sitting now.

“I think I’ve got enough to make a few more, but go ahead and eat these while they’re hot,” Zeb’s saying, but it’s canceled out by the sound of Sabine’s shocked gasp, the way she claps her hands over her mouth when she sees his face.

“Zeb!” Sabine exclaims. “What _happened_ to you?” Much like Hera a few minutes ago, Sabine is at his side, her cup of caf forgotten, her hands hovering near his injuries, not touching.

Zeb meets Hera’s gaze, then shifts his eyes away, looking around the room. He reaches up, scratching at his right ear. “Uh, I, uh,” he starts. “Well, you see, I was in the cantina over on the command ship last night, and I, uh, slipped and fell.”

Out of the corner of her eye, Hera can barely see Kallus performing a gesture unwittingly adopted from Sabine, covering his face with his open hand, shaking his head.

“You _slipped_ and _fell_?” Sabine is asking Zeb, her eyes narrowed suspiciously, both her hands on her hips.

“Yeah,” Zeb says, turning away, his attention back on the stove.

“Zeb,” Sabine says, her hand on his uninjured shoulder, tugging at him, trying to get him to turn back to face her again. “There’s no way that’s what happened.”

Zeb just shrugs. Hera can feel her temper rising the more Zeb deflects, her jaw tensing, her scowl deepening.

“Were you _drinking_?” Sabine asks. Zeb cuts a shifty look over at Kallus, but he’s sitting back in the booth, his arms folded over his chest, very obviously staying out of this one. Smart man, Hera thinks distantly, around the roar of her frustration in her ears.

“No,” Zeb says, not at all convincingly. Sabine frowns, tight and miserable, and Hera feels something angry inside her chest snap.

“Garazeb Orrelios,” she says again, walking over to stand next to Sabine. “Do we lie to each other in this family like that?” she asks, both hands on her hips, her chin jutting out in challenge.

Zeb looks at the floor.

“Tell Sabine what happened,” Hera says.

“Hera,” Zeb says anxiously. “I -- I thought we were going to talk about this later.”

“Too bad, we’re talking about it now,” Hera says. “Tell. Her,” she insists.

Zeb swallows heavily, doesn’t look up at either of them, wrings his hands together. “I’ve --” he starts, haltingly, rubbing one hand over the back of his neck. He sighs. “Okay, I’ve been drinking again. A little. Sometimes.”

Sabine sighs. “Well, I know _that_ ,” she says.

Zeb looks up at her in surprise. “Wait, you do?” he asks.

“Uh, yeah?” Sabine says. “It’s -- it’s pretty kriffing obvious,” she says quietly. “That’s how you’re dealing with --” Sabine glances over at Hera, bites her bottom lip.

“Go on,” Hera says.

“I know it’s how you’re dealing with what happened on Lothal,” Sabine says gently.

Zeb shrugs again. “Okay, so what if it is.”

“It’s not healthy?” Sabine says, frowning at him. She glances back over at Hera, then at Zeb. “Anyway, what happened to your face?”

Zeb sighs again. “I got in a fight,” he admits. He looks up at Hera. “Hera,” he says, wringing his hands together tightly again.

Hera sighs, too, rolls her eyes. “Let me guess,” she says, holding her left hand out in front of her, ticking phrases off on the fingers of her left hand with her right index finger as she talks, sad, a little self-deprecating. “What a dumb slut, how did that bitch get to be a general anyway, useless to the cause, all Twi’leks are fast and loose, who knows who the father is, the father was Grand Admiral Thrawn, it’s going to come out a mutant half-breed, Phoenix Squadron’s reputation is ruined?”

Zeb flinches, nods. “More or less,” he says miserably.

“Oh,” Sabine says.

“It’s not _right_ ,” Zeb says fiercely, picking his head up. “It’s completely kriffin’ disrespectful,” he says, “and, and K --” he stutters, can’t says his name, gasps in a desperate breath, “he wouldn’t want --”

“Kanan isn’t here,” Hera says, slow, matter-of-fact, both her hands on her hips.

“That’s exactly the kriffing problem!” Zeb exclaims, too harsh, too loud, waving his hands at her, his chest heaving in breaths that are coming sharper, faster.

Hera lifts her right hand, pinches the bridge of her nose between her thumb and her forefinger, her left hand drifting to her abdomen, resting over the place where the baby’s started kicking her again. She sighs. “Zeb,” she starts, reaching for gentleness despite her anger. “Do you really think Kanan would want to see you like this, like how you were last night?” she asks, uncovering her face, both her hands on her abdomen, now. “Drinking, fighting, being as reckless as you were when we first brought you on board?”

“Well, do you really think he’d want to hear the rebellion’s own people talking about _our family_ like that?” Zeb growls in return.

“Zeb,” Sabine says. “Those are new recruits who don’t even know us. Hera outranks them by, like, four levels of command, and we’ve both personally gotten a few of them formally written up over that bullshit. It shouldn’t matter what they think, because Command _knows_ us, knows how good Hera is at her job.” She reaches for him, laying a hand on his elbow, but he pulls away from her touch, his chest still heaving. “Command knew Kanan and Ezra, remember? They know what really happened.”

“It’s okay to grieve, however you need,” Hera says softly, a lesson that was so hard for her to learn, herself, until she’d finally gotten to see a counselor, had finally gotten some help thinking through everything. “We all need to grieve, differently, at our own time, in our own way. But it’s not okay to hurt yourself drinking again and giving in to the rumor mill, and to lie to us about it, and to not let us go through this with you.”

Zeb’s head is bowed, and he covers his face with a broad hand. Hera reaches for him, lays her hand on his elbow, and he doesn’t pull away, this time. “Hera --” he says, his voice breaking. She tugs on his elbow, pulls him in, and he leans down, into her, lets her wrap her arms around his shaking shoulders, careful of his injury.

“I’m ruining your birthday,” he mumbles.

“No,” Hera says, “you’re not,” but Zeb shakes his head against her, pulls away.

“Hera,” Zeb says, “I’m sorry,” and he draws a shaky breath, looks at Sabine, but the moment is broken by the chime of Sabine’s comm.

“ _Shadowcaster_ to _Ghost_ , requesting permission to dock,” is what comes out through her comm, and Sabine smiles.

“Zeb,” Sabine says, laying her hand on his elbow again. “Sounds like you better get started on that second batch of pancakes.”

Zeb nods, sniffs, scrubs his hand over his face. “I’m sorry,” he says again, quiet, honest, looking between Hera and Sabine.

“We’re not done,” Hera says, and Zeb nods.

“Will we ever be?” Sabine asks, a wise heaviness in her voice. Sabine looks up at Zeb. “We’ll never be done missing Kanan and Ezra,” she says quietly. “But that doesn’t mean we can’t -- and shouldn’t -- still live, the way _they’d_ want us to. Not just reacting to how much it hurts that they’re gone, but -- still fighting for what’s right, still finding little moments of hope, still celebrating each other, still defending the family _we_ built together, with them. Which, today --” Her comm chimes again -- “ _Ghost_?” Ketsu’s asking impatiently -- and Sabine grins, lifts her wrist to her face. “Go ahead and dock to the starboard airlock, _Shadowcaster_ ,” Sabine says into her comm. She turns her face back to Zeb, but she puts her hand on Hera’s shoulder, squeezes. “Today, we have a full house to enjoy for Hera’s birthday,” she says decisively, setting off for the airlock.

“That’s our girl,” Hera says fondly, watching her leave.

“Yep,” Zeb agrees.

-

“You weren’t kidding about the full house, were you,” Hera remarks.

“Nope,” Sabine says proudly.

It’s nearly dinnertime, now, and Hera has very much been enjoying her day despite herself, despite last night, despite this morning. Zeb’s been a bit withdrawn, quietly and stoically at her side or at Kallus’s for much of the day, though he’s still been helping Sabine sneak twenty-nine affectionate, light punches in on Hera through the course of the day. Mostly, though, it’s been a louder ship than usual, everyone somehow getting the day mostly free from their duties, hanging out in the common area, catching up over games of dejarik, munching on the fresh shuura and muja fruits Sabine and Tristan brought back with them. At first it had just been the eight of them, Hera and Zeb and Kallus and Sabine and Chopper and Tristan and Ketsu, but the number has grown since, Wolffe showing up around mid-day with Jai Kell and Mart Mattin.

It’s nice to have so many people on board all at once again. The _Ghost_ has been stationed with a flotilla of a few other rebel ships for nearly two months now, floating in orbit around a moon of Dantooine, the rebel fleet spread out into small groups throughout the galaxy while the Pathfinder initiative searches for a new permanent base location, and Hera’s been missing the bustle of Yavin IV that never failed to remind her of the bigger cause, give her a little hope, even while she was struggling to claw her way through the worst of her grief in the immediate aftermath of Kanan and Ezra’s deaths, compounded by the sickness that had plagued her during the first trimester of her pregnancy. Even now that she’s slowly moving through her grief, feeling physically better in her second trimester, all this cold, empty space, doing everything over holocomm and data transmissions, ration bars for nearly every meal, laying so low in the wake of their defeat -- it hasn’t felt good at all, the loss of Yavin heavy and ever-present alongside her personal losses.

So, much as Hera had tried to tell Sabine and Zeb not to do anything, the full house today has been a very welcome change. It almost feels like the old days, like everything she didn’t realize she needed, listening to everyone chatting and laughing, showing off the things they’ve all brought along. Food, mostly, is what everyone’s brought -- for which Hera’s grateful, since it reduces her worry over how in the world she’s going to feed them all dinner, as ad-hoc as it’s turning out to be (bantha steaks topped with poached eggs; spiced tofu and vegetables over rice; three different kinds of fresh fruits; tiny little cakes speckled with Chandrilian grappaberries). Ketsu’s the one who’s surprised her the most so far, with a bundle of things for the baby: Blocks and a stuffed tooka toy, some onesies, a package of cloth diapers, the softest blanket Hera’s ever laid hands on. “It takes a village,” Ketsu had said simply, warmly, and Hera had struggled to keep her feelings at bay at that.

The day has lazed on, affectionate and warm inside the _Ghost_ , Hera’s heart as full as the refrigerator. It takes a village, indeed, she thinks, looking around at everyone. It’s nearly dinnertime, and Hera is relaxing in her favorite chair, Sabine sitting at her feet, half sketching something in her sketchbook, half watching Ketsu and Tristan kicking Jai and Mart’s asses at a game of two-on-two dejarik. Zeb’s perked up, and he’s grilling the bantha steaks now, goodnaturedly taking unsolicited advice from Wolffe about how to do it while Wolffe works on cutting up some kind of green vegetable that Hera doesn’t quite recognize.

“Make five extra plates!” Sabine calls over to Zeb, over the sound of Ketsu laughing and Jai and Mart groaning as she makes the winning move.

“Five _extra_?” Hera asks.

“Yeah,” Sabine says. “ _Someone’s_ late, but they should be here any time now.”

“Do we even have that many chairs?” Hera asks. There’s a clatter behind her, and she sees Chopper and Kallus, dragging some storage crates into the room, squeezing them in around the table.

“Long as we got crates, we got chairs,” Zeb says, shrugging, and Hera shakes her head.

“Who else could you possibly have coming?” Hera asks Sabine. “Did you go scouring the unknown regions of wild space for dinner guests?”

Sabine leans her head back against Hera’s knees. “Hera,” Sabine says softly, and Hera realizes her mistake, slaps her hand over her mouth. She was joking when she mentioned the unknown regions, but she should have known better, should have remembered what Sabine’s still been trying to do, late at night when she gets a spare moment, the data she’s spent weeks desperately and fruitlessly gathering and studying.

Sabine’s shaking her head, turning her body to look up at Hera. “I wish I could find him,” Sabine says, hurt and guilt and sincerity plain in her face. “You know I wish I could, but I --”

Hera lays her hand on Sabine’s head. “No, I’m sorry,” Hera says. “I -- I didn’t think before I --” she shakes her head, sighs, runs her fingers through Sabine’s short hair. “I’m not expecting you to perform miracles, sweetheart,” she says.

Sabine frowns. “I _know_ Ezra’s out there, somewhere,” she says. “I just don’t know where.” She sighs. “Or how to find him.”

“It’s okay,” Hera says, smoothing Sabine’s hair.

“Anyway,” Sabine says, making a visible effort to brighten up, getting to her feet to start helping Wolffe set the table. “This is from much, much closer to home.”

Zeb and Wolffe make plates for everyone, and the five extra, too, which they leave on the stove, soaking up residual warmth from the heating element. Sabine glances at her wrist chrono, frowns, but she says, “I guess they’re later than they thought they’d be, we should go ahead and eat,” so everyone crowds in around the dejarik table. A few people are perched on crates, balancing their plates on their knees, but they don’t seem to mind, the dinner conversation fast and excited, ranging from everything from the Pathfinders’ efforts in searching for a base to the results of the most recent podrace series on Nal Hutta.

Halfway through dinner, Sabine’s wrist comm chimes, and she jumps up from the table, grinning broadly. “Time for those extra plates,” she says, disappearing down the hall. The _Ghost_ shifts, the feeling, Hera thinks, of an additional vessel docking to the _Shadowcaster_ , the port airlock taken already by Mart’s shuttle.

A few moments later, Hera’s heart warms even more than she thought possible, when a familiar voice calls down the hall, “Permission to come aboard, General?”

Wolffe chuckles; Hera smiles. “Permission granted, Captain,” she yells back at Rex, down the hall, and she gets up from the table, her hands on her hips, waiting for him. She glances over at Wolffe, who’s also gotten up. “I was a little nervous it was going to be Hondo and Vizago,” she admits, and the whole room laughs.

“They’re unfortunately tied up in a mission,” Zeb says, and before Hera can give much attention to the the funny way he said that, Rex is walking into the room, and Hera and Wolffe are both heading for him. Rex passes a big box to Wolffe, the two men clapping one another on the shoulder as they pass the box.

Hera hugs Rex, and she’s vaguely aware of Wolffe saying, “Mm, fresh meiloorun!” but it’s the voices that’re drifting down the hall, greeting Sabine, that catch her attention. She lifts her head, looks over Rex’s shoulder, and he squeezes her shoulder, murmurs, “Happy birthday, Hera,” moves out of the way.

“I can’t believe it,” Hera whispers.

It’s Numa, and it’s Gobi, and, holy _kriff_ , it’s Goll -- Goll, who took her in when she was a teenager, in that awkward phase between wanting nothing to do with her dad and finally being old enough to strike out on her own; Goll, who she hasn’t heard from in years, was afraid was dead -- and, and behind him, it’s --

“Father,” Hera breathes, and she’s afraid her smile’s going to split her face, afraid that her heart’s going to crack in two.

“Happy birthday, daughter,” Cham says warmly.

She takes a few steps toward him, pausing just out of touching range.

“You haven’t --” She feels her smile falter, feels her throat going tight, and, damn it, she does _not_ want to start crying, not in front of all these people on her ship -- “Father, you haven’t spent time with me on my birthday since I was a little girl,” she says, swallowing around the tightness in her throat, taking a shaky breath in. It’s not that she means for it to sound so accusatory -- it just comes out that way, years of old hurts and coldness between them impossible to avoid, despite their recent efforts to begin repairing them.

Cham’s face falls. “I know,” he says softly. “And I know, now, that I was wrong, back then. I’m sorry, Hera.” He glances to his right, and Hera realizes Sabine’s standing there, just behind her left shoulder, has come around from behind the group. “But I heard that you and your family make a point out of birthdays,” he says, smiling, meeting Sabine’s eyes over Hera’s shoulder. He sighs, looking back at Hera. “Your mother always loved them, too.”

“Yeah,” Hera says. “She did.”

“So,” Cham says, “I thought, if you’d have me, I’d start making a point, too.” He holds his arms out, open to her. “Can we start new?”

Hera takes another shaky breath, clenching her jaw against the tears she can feel brimming in her eyes.

“I’d like that, Baba,” Hera whispers, nodding, and she closes the distance between them, turning her face into his shoulder, unable to stop herself from crying a little, hiding her face in his body.

Hera’s given and received so many hugs already today, but this, this is the best one so far. She feels herself melt into him, her arms wrapping tight around his lean waist, both his arms around her back, years of conflict and the desire to mend the old hurts overwhelming her, the press of her round stomach between them like a promise. She leans the side of her head against his left shoulder, her breath hitching in an audible sob.

“Sorry,” she whispers, feeling one of his hands rubbing over her back.

“No,” he insists, pulling her a little closer, resting his chin on the top of her head. “No, I am the one who should be apologizing to you.”

She hasn’t seen him face to face in months, but they’ve been talking on the comm and exchanging text messages more and more often, recently, both work and personal. Phoenix Squadron’s work with the Free Ryloth group in the past couple years has done a lot to improve their relationship already, but something about Hera’s grief over losing Kanan and Ezra had driven her to reach out to Cham, more, and deeper, and she’s been surprised, in a good way, at how reliably he’s come through for her, these past months: At how they’ve been able to start really repairing their relationship, navigating the old hurts, the wedge her mom’s death drove between them; at how much dealing with that old grief has also helped her figure out how to deal with the newer, fresher ones. It’ll take time, but they’re working on it, now, and that’s what matters.

Cham holds her for a moment longer while Hera gets control over her tears. At length, she pulls away a little, turns her head, looks over at Sabine. “Thank you, sweetheart,” she says, opening her left arm to her, her right arm still around Cham.

“Yeah,” Sabine says, and she goes to her, leans into Hera’s left arm, presses her face into Hera’s left shoulder, sighs, relaxes into her.

Hera turns her head, kisses Sabine’s forehead. “Love you,” she whispers to her.

Hera’s stomach jumps -- the baby’s kicking her again, all of a sudden -- and she startles, feels Sabine startle, too.

“What’s wrong?” Sabine asks, pulling back slightly from her embrace, frowning down at her abdomen, feeling the movement where she’s pressed into Hera still.

Hera tilts her head to one side, thinking about how happy she feels right now, wedged in between her father and Sabine, with so many people in the ship -- how content, how _hopeful_ , despite the war, despite their losses, despite everything. “Nothing,” she says with a slow smile. “Nothing’s wrong.”

“Then, what is it?” Sabine asks.

“I think it’s what’s _right_ ,” Hera says.

-

(Later, after dinner, after honoring Kanan and Ezra and so many others, lost along the way, after Hera sets her birthday wish’s intention toward healing, for what feels like the millionth year in a row, after everyone disperses back to their own ships, staying the night or not, after Hera settles down with a quiet cup of tea, gives herself a few minutes to focus on how intensely she misses them, misses Kanan and Ezra -- after the fullest day she’s experienced in awhile, she’s rinsing out her tea mug, getting ready to go to bed, and she hears raised voices in the hall.

“No way!” Sabine, animated.

“Come on.” Zeb, frustrated. “Why not?”

“I am _not_ getting rid of my own artwork,” Sabine says. “That painting makes me happy.”

“Sabine,” Zeb argues back. “That painting makes me so -- I don’t know. Upset.”

Hera sighs, shakes her head, walks into the hall. “Guys,” she says. They both turn to look at her, matching guilty expressions on their faces. “You can compromise,” Hera says, when they both say nothing. “How can we all best help each other figure out how to get through what’s hurting?” she says, one hand on her hip, not expecting either of them to have a ready answer.

Sabine sighs, and Zeb scratches at his right ear. “You’re right,” Zeb says.

“We’re a family,” Hera says, both of them nodding in agreement. “We’ll figure it out.” She glances between the two of them. “Okay?”

“Okay,” they say, together.

“Thank you both for everything today,” she says, heading for her room, laying a hand on each of their shoulders as she passes them in the hall. “You guys reminded me how good it is to be together.”

“Wait until we get to start celebrating _their_ birthday,” Sabine says, gesturing with her open hand to Hera’s round stomach.

“Oh, I can’t wait,” Hera says, rolling her eyes but smiling as the door to her room closes behind her.)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> the moods for this chapter - talking to fog by iron & wine, and ain’t that fine by i’m with her


	6. 8 ABY

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i’d give anything to hear you say it one more time  
> that the universe was made  
> just to be seen by my eyes  
> with shortness of breath, i’ll explain the infinite  
> how rare and beautiful it truly is that we exist
> 
> -
> 
> you don’t see it when it’s happening  
> happens over time  
> first you’re laughing, then you’re crying  
> then you can’t decide  
> my life’s uncertain and sometimes it’s strange  
> but one thing i’ve learned is it won’t stay the same  
> even in the darkness, i’ll be okay  
> the sun will come up, the seasons will change
> 
> -
> 
> even when we’re way down, way down low  
> we dream, yeah, we dream on up  
> when we are are way down, way down low  
> the stars light a new hope in us

**+i. - 8 ABY**

Hera wakes up the night before Jacen’s seventh birthday to the sound of her door swishing open, to the soft fall of his bare feet on the floor, to his hand pulling the covers back, to him climbing in, whispering, “Hey, Mama.”

He’s probably too old to be doing this still, too big, but she’ll never turn him away, never deny her baby these midnight cuddles. She yawns and wraps her arms around him as he snuggles into her bed. She pulls the covers around him, tilts her head down and presses a kiss to his forehead. “What got you up?” she asks, feeling him settle in next to her, both of them laying on their sides, nose to nose. His profile is just visible in the low glow of the nightlight in the corner of the room, his hair sticking out at every angle imaginable from sleep.

“Mama?” he asks.

“Yes, baby,” she replies.

Jacen huffs out a frustrated sigh, like he’s trying to figure something out. “When is Dad coming back?” he asks.

“What?” she says, surprised, caught off guard.

“You said,” he starts, accusatory, inquisitive -- Kanan’s kid in every way, when he gets like this. “You said Ezra and Dad passed on around the same time,” he says.

“They did,” she says, slow, wary of where this could be going.

“But Ezra came back,” Jacen concludes. “So Dad will, too.”

Hera sighs. “It’s not exactly the same, love,” she tells him.

“Why?” he asks.

“Because.” Hera bites her lip, not entirely sure how to navigate this. “They passed on in -- different ways. With Ezra -- we really didn’t know what happened to him. We had to keep hoping, because -- because we just didn’t know. With your dad.” She sighs, shakes her head, runs her fingers slowly through his hair. “We know what happened to your dad,” she whispers. “Ezra and Sabine and I -- we were there, we saw.” Hera closes her eyes and bows her face into the top of Jacen’s head, pushing her nose into his soft hair, breathing him in.

“But --” Jacen starts.

“It’s not the same,” she says firmly, her lips moving against his forehead, an image of fire exploding on the back of her closed eyelids -- fire, and Kanan’s outstretched hands. “No matter how much we might want it to be.”

“But how do you _know,_ ” Jacen insists.

“I just know,” she says.

“But that doesn’t make sense,” he says.

Hera picks her head up, opens her eyes, smiles, despite herself. “I know, baby,” she says. “But your dad is here.” She reaches for Jacen, taps at his chest, at his heart. “And he’s here,” she adds, capturing his small hand in her own, laying it over her own heart, trying to steady her emotions out, trying to blink back the tears she can feel prickling at the edges of her eyes, drawn there by the sudden surge of emotion she’s feeling, thinking about Kanan. “He’ll always be right here,” she whispers, swallowing heavily.

Jacen makes a small sound in the back of his throat, a huff of disbelief, and it’s so reminiscent of Sabine that Hera shakes her head, her smile growing.

“Why can’t we go look?” he asks around a yawn. “Like how Sabine and ‘Soka looked for Ezra?”

“Because we can’t,” Hera says. “But.” She pauses, thinks, lost, for a long moment, memories of Kanan that she normally keeps shoved in the recesses of her mind dancing to the forefront of her awareness.

“But what?” Jacen asks.

“We can look in our feelings,” she tells him.

He purses his lips at her, so dramatically she can see his little scowl even in the low light of the nightlight.

“Still your mind. What do your feelings tell you, love?” she asks, smoothing her fingers over his hair.

“I can feel that you’re sad,” he says eventually.

Hera smiles. “Right now, feelings in the Force for you are just kind of like --” she pauses, thinks for the right phrase, something he’ll get. “Like feeling the sun on your skin when you go outside, right?”

Jacen nods.

“Well,” Hera says, still petting his hair. “When you’ve learned a little more about feelings, you can -- you can learn to channel your _own_ feelings. Soon, I think you can probably look for your dad in your feelings, in the Force.”

“That doesn’t make _sense_ , Mom,” he insists, after a long pause.

“I know,” Hera says. “Ezra can help you understand.”

Jacen sighs heavily, frustrated, frowning at her. Hera runs her hands over his head, over his shoulders.

“Go back to sleep, love,” she whispers, pulling him closer, tugging the blankets over their bodies.

-

Of course Hera has always done all the old birthday traditions with Jacen. She puts up her mom’s banner in the galley; Zeb makes fruit pancakes for breakfast; Sabine trims Jacen’s hair, administers the friendly punches.

But there’s a new tradition Hera’s added, one she never would have been able to offer him before: Freedom of movement, of choice of _where_ Jacen wants to spend his birthday. There’s been a thrill in the newness of this, the past three years now, a luxury that she can take a few days off and that there’s so many safe and free and open choices now. Before, the best she’d been able to do was a walk, a hike, if they were somewhere safe, and if they had the time. These days, though, she can afford to take the family much farther. Last year, Jacen had chosen a trip to Mon Cala, and they’d all had the most fun time touring the newly reopened aquarium, one of the best in the galaxy.

This year -- this year, though, he’d just said he wanted to be wherever Ezra wanted to be.

“You sure, kiddo?” Ezra had asked.

“Positive,” Jacen said.

“Because you know that I just want to be on Lothal,” Ezra had told him.

“So take me somewhere I’ve never been on Lothal,” Jacen had bargained, and Ezra had agreed.

Last night, after Jacen had gone to bed but before he’d slipped in and woken Hera up in the middle of the night, Ezra, quiet and thoughtful, had made two cups of tea, had sat with Hera, watching as she’d hung the birthday banner up, as she’d made sure the galley was clean for breakfast in the morning, as she’d taken her seat across from him in the dejarik booth.

“You don’t have to go with us tomorrow, you know,” he’d said softly. “Sabine said you haven’t been back there since.” Ezra had sighed, not finishing his thought, looking away, peering contemplatively down into the curls of steam wafting off the top of his tea mug. “If you’re not ready,” he’d added, “I understand.”

Hera’s had seven years of practice of dealing with the jolt of shock she feels when glimpses of Kanan shine through in Jacen: In his mannerism, his tone, the way his eyes gleam and crinkle at the corners when he laughs. Seven years of practice of dealing with the unexpected joy it brings her, a joy that always walks hand-in-hand with an angry burst of deep sorrow, a painful longing in her bones. At first, when Jacen suddenly wasn’t an infant anymore but a small person, a small person who reminded her suddenly of Kanan, giving her these shocks, the sorrow had always been greater than the joy. But now, with time and with love’s help, they’re mostly even. Sometimes, these days, the joy even wins.

This past month with Ezra, though, it’s been like she’s been back in square one. There’s so much about him that feels to her almost the same as he was years ago, but there’s also so much about him that’s grown up, older, serious, and so much like Kanan, now. Ezra’s as old, now, as Kanan was when they first met Ezra, she realized the other day, and _that_ really put things into perspective. So many things about him have been catching her off guard, shocking her deeply in the weeks he’s been back, bringing to her that miserable rush of sorrow and longing she used to feel so frequently back in Jacen’s toddler days. And they’ve been things large and small, everything from the way Ezra wears the low ponytail at the base of his neck, to the affection in the way he calls Jacen _kiddo_ , to the way he’d sunken to his knees on the floor of his old room, his first night back, buried his face in the crook of Zeb’s neck, _howled_. Things like the small, still things that had passed between them last night, the way he’d gazed into his mug of tea as though it held all the answers.

“I haven’t been,” she’d said, feeling that rush of sorrow and longing in the way Ezra had reminded her so much of Kanan in that moment, trying to reach for the joy inherent in the fact that she’d been sitting at the table with him at all, after so many years. “But, with you, I -- I think I’d like to.”

Ezra had smiled at that, soft, gentle. “Okay,” he’d said.

“Are you sure _you’re_ ready?” Hera had asked him.

“Yeah,” Ezra had said, soft and slow, staring into his tea. “There’s something there for us. For Jacen, and for me. And -- ” he’d paused. “If you want to be there. For you, too.”

Hera had felt something like fear grab at her at the certainty in his voice, a wariness she hadn’t felt since the end of the war. “What is it?” she’d asked.

“I don’t know,” Ezra had said thoughtfully. “Could be his crystal.”

“I hope not,” Hera had said. “He’s too young to start training.”

Ezra had looked up at her, his face serious. “Not by much,” Ezra had said. “He’s already learning --”

Hera had huffed out a sigh. “I mean _formal_ training,” she’d said. “Meditation’s different.”

Ezra had arched a suspicious eyebrow at her. “You do know Sabine’s been teaching him some forms, too, right?” he’d asked. “Footwork, combat foundations?”

Hera had sighed again, rolled her eyes, shaken her head. “Yeah, I know,” she’d said. “What else could I expect, with how involved she’s always been?” She’d smiled. “I mean, one of his first words was ‘boom.’”

“Wait, really?” Ezra had said, cracking a sudden grin, laughing a little.

“Really,” Hera had said, thinking fondly back on how small Jacen had been, how cold Hoth had been, how intent Sabine had been on her work and on helping Hera parent Jacen, how that had somehow turned into teaching Jacen about explosives far earlier than Hera would have preferred, bundled up close to Sabine’s chest in the carrying sling while she’d worked, her coat zipped securely over them both. “It later became, ‘Bine go boom,’” she’d added, and Ezra had laughed more.

“That’s awesome,” he’d said. But his face had quickly fallen, and Hera had felt it, too, a stillness washing over them.

“I am absolutely not sending him away for Jedi training,” Hera had said, leaning forward, meeting Ezra’s gaze, so serious it almost hurt. “I know Luke means well, but.”

“No,” Ezra had agreed, shaking his head. “No, that’s not his path.” Ezra had closed his eyes, a long moment of thought wrapping around him. “Think about it, Hera,” he had said, sounding so old. “I’m not anything close to a traditional Jedi,” Ezra had said. “Kanan wasn’t really, either, by the time he -- and, if Jacen’s abilities, his sensitivities, turn out to be what I think they’ll be, he won’t be anything like a traditional Jedi, either. I don’t think either of us need to be any part of Luke’s revival of the old ways.” Ezra had shaken his head. “However good his intentions might be.”

Hera had felt some measure of relief at that, had sighed her fear out of her, trusting Ezra to keep their family intact.

“But, I think,” Ezra had started again, letting the end of the sentence drift away.

“What?” Hera had asked, still leaning forward.

“I was just thinking,” he’d said, soft, measured, opening his eyes, “that I don’t want to miss any more of his firsts.”

Hera had nodded, waiting for Ezra to ask, to say it, to finally broach what they’d been dancing around for the past couple weeks -- his rapidly-growing bond with Jacen that started the moment they met (“You're so _familiar_ ,” Jacen had exclaimed, embracing Ezra tightly), the fact that, somehow, Hera knew, in the deepest corner of her heart, that Ezra was meant to train Jacen, to guide him in his developing abilities and sensitivities in the Force -- but he hadn’t said anything. He’d just huffed out a soft sigh, finished his tea, gotten up from the table with his mug in his hand.

“There’s something at the temple grounds for us, Hera,” he’d said, an air of finality in his tone. He’d eyed her carefully, picking up her mug, too, setting them both in the sink, his small movements around the galley so familiar they nearly hurt to watch. “Something for all three of us, I think.”

They’d gone to bed, then, and Jacen had crawled into Hera’s bed in the middle of the night, asking hard questions about Kanan, and Hera had wondered.

-

In the morning, it feels like birthdays have always felt on the _Ghost_ , something comforting and familiar in the way Jacen wakes Hera up before the sun’s up because he’s kicking her in the spleen in his sleep, in the way she gets to savor half her cup of caf and the smell of Zeb flipping pancakes before Jacen finally rouses, in the way he comes thundering into the galley in his pajamas and his bare feet, launching himself at Zeb.

“Thanks for making pancakes!” Jacen exclaims, and everyone’s laughing and smiling at him, at this bright spot of a kid who’s always so full of energy, who never fails to put a smile on their faces. Zeb and Sabine and Kallus all immediately punch him gently as Jacen makes his rounds of the galley, saying good morning, giving out hugs. Ezra reaches over, once Jacen’s sitting down at the dejarik table, gets in on the fun, catching Jacen by his shoulders and cuffing him on the back of the head, Zeb’s signature move.

After breakfast, Sabine sits Jacen down, trims his soft, wild hair while Hera gets the _Phantom_ ready to fly.

Hera slides down the ladder back into the _Ghost_ and finds herself in the middle of a moment between Ezra and Zeb, Ezra’s back turned to her, his face pressed into Zeb’s chest, Zeb’s arms tight around him, Sabine and Kallus hovering just to Zeb’s left. Kallus glances up at her, makes a face Hera can’t totally interpret, the smallest shake of his head. She leans back against the ladder, content to wait, to let the moment play out.

“You’ll be okay,” Zeb’s telling Ezra, running of his big hands over Ezra’s hair.

“It’s not too late to call it off,” Sabine says softly, lines of concern in her face.

“No,” Ezra says, muffled into Zeb’s shoulder. “No, we’ll be fine, I don’t know why I --” He pulls back a little from Zeb, looks at Sabine. “Just a weird feeling,” he says. Sabine frowns.

“Okay, I’m ready!” Jacen’s hollering. Hera can hear him making his way down the hall into the room.

Ezra quickly pulls all the way out of Zeb’s embrace, scrubs one hand over his face, smooths it up over the top of his hair, huffs out a sigh, deep and quick.

“You’re ready, huh?” Ezra asks Jacen, propping both his hands on his hips.

“Yeah,” Jacen says. He glances over at Hera. “Are you ready, Mom?”

“I am,” she says.

Jacen turns to Zeb and Sabine and Kallus. “You’re in charge while we’re gone,” he tells them, the perfect imitation of Hera, making everyone laugh. “Don’t burn the ship down.”

“Yes sir, Spectre Seven,” Zeb says, firing off a sloppy salute.

“Ezra,” Sabine says softly, and she pulls him to her for a brief hug.

“We'll be fine,” Ezra says again.

Jacen leads the way up into the _Phantom_ , Ezra behind him, Hera taking up the rear. She hesitates, halfway up the ladder, briefly reconsidering her decision to have Chopper stay with Sabine, run some diagnostics on the _Ghost_ ’s auxiliary systems while they’re gone. But what good would it really do for him to go with them, she thinks, so she just turns to look back at Zeb and Sabine and Kallus, says, “Comm me if you need anything,” and keeps climbing up into the _Phantom_.

Hera takes her place in the pilot’s seat, Jacen already strapping into the co-pilot’s seat. “Hey,” Hera asks gently, glancing over at him, “don’t you want to let Ezra co-pilot?”

“I’ll be fine right here,” Ezra says, standing close behind her, his left hand resting on the back of Hera’s seat and his right on the back of Jacen’s. “Don’t worry about it.”

Hera’s sure she knows how to get there, verified the coordinates with Chopper last night, but Ezra still starts talking to Jacen about how where they’re going is a sacred place, a place strong with the Force.

“Can you reach out, feel it calling you?” Ezra asks him. Jacen frowns, closes his eyes.

“Maybe?” he says, his nose and forehead crinkling in concentration. Ezra smiles, drops his hand from the back of Jacen’s chair to his shoulder.

“We’ll get there,” Ezra says.

Before long, Hera’s setting the _Phantom_ down at the edge of the familiar, open plain, the grasses still strangely bare in the place where the temple once stood. “Well,” she says, looking out over the emptiness in front of them, the midday sun casting a shimmer over the taller grass in the distance. “Here we are.”

She opens the hatch, and the three of them walk down together, Ezra’s hand on Jacen’s shoulder. “Woah,” Jacen says, once they’ve gotten a half-dozen paces away from the _Phantom._

“You feel that?” Ezra asks. Jacen nods, glancing up at Ezra with wide eyes. “Told you this place was sacred,” Ezra says with a smile. “There used to be a Jedi temple here.”

“What happened to it?” Jacen asks.

Ezra sighs. “It was destroyed,” he says.

“By the Empire?” Jacen asks.

“Partially,” Ezra says. “But also partially by its own choice. And partially with my help.”

“What?” Jacen asks, tilting his head up at Ezra.

“It’s a really long story,” Ezra says. “I’ll tell you someday.” He pauses, looks around. “But I don’t think that’s why we’re here today,” he says. He starts walking again, his hand still on Jacen’s shoulder, Hera still one pace behind them, just listening, observing, drifting in her memories of the last time she was in this place.

“Why _are_ we here?” Jacen asks.

“I don’t know,” Ezra says. “Why do you think we’re here?”

“I don’t know,” Jacen says.

“Hmm,” Ezra hums thoughtfully.

“What do you think, Mom?” Jacen asks, turning to look at her.

Hera looks carefully between Ezra and Jacen, closes her eyes, remembers the way, the last time she was in this place, she’d thought she’d felt the ghost of Kanan’s touch on her shoulder. “Do you know something I always, always believed, about your dad?” she asks him.

“What?” Jacen says.

“Even when I didn’t understand something happening around us, even when he maybe didn’t understand at first, deep down, in his heart, he followed his feelings,” she tells him. “It was hard for us to trust each other when we first met. And it was hard for Sabine, and Zeb, and even for Ezra to trust us at first, right?” Hera asks, glancing at Ezra. Ezra nods. “But I always trusted that we -- Kanan -- he _knew_ what he was doing. Even when what he was doing was following someone else’s plan.” She looks back at Jacen. “Remember, baby, how we talked last night about feelings?”

“Like the sun on my skin,” Jacen says, tilting his face up to the sun, high over them, warm but not overly hot, spring just starting to bloom.

“Right,” Hera says. “So, I think, we’re here to see what you guys feel. And I think you’ll know what it is when you feel it.”

Ezra smiles at her. “Your mom’s one of the smartest people I know,” he says, squeezing Jacen’s shoulder. “Relax your mind. See what you feel.”

“I feel,” Jacen starts, his thought trailing off, his eyes drifting closed, his face still tilted up to the sun, but he doesn’t finish his sentence, just shrugs. “I feel like walking more,” he says, and he slides out from under Ezra’s hand, strikes out, taking the lead.

They walk through the empty plain for nearly twenty minutes, Jacen exuberantly in the lead, Ezra falling into step with Hera, occasionally glancing sidelong at her, as though checking on her.

Ezra pauses abruptly.

“What is it?” Hera asks. Jacen stops, too, turns around, looks at both of them with his hands on his hips.

Ezra looks at Jacen. “Do you hear that?” he says.

“Do I hear what?” Jacen asks, tilting his head to one side.

Ezra kneels, presses his hand to the ground beneath him. “You have to listen to what the world around you has to say sometimes,” he says. Jacen comes close, mirrors Ezra, kneels in front of him, facing him, pressing his own small palm to the earth. It’s startlingly familiar to Hera, as though she’s seen them do this a million times before, and she wonders if she’s getting her memories of Kanan and Ezra mixed up with her memories of Ezra and Jacen, or if this is something the Force is influencing in her memories, or --

“Can you hear it?” Ezra asks. Jacen’s closed his eyes, and the concentration on his face reminds Hera of Ezra’s thinking face, the way his mouth quirks from one side to the other.

“Yeah,” Jacen says slowly. He opens his eyes, glances up at Hera. “Listen, Mama,” he says. Hera sighs, kneels beside them, presses her hand to the ground, not expecting to hear anything, indulging him, nonetheless, knowing how strangely the Force moves, sometimes.

“Woah,” Jacen breathes.

“What do you hear, kiddo?” Ezra asks.

“Something calling,” Jacen whispers. “The balance.”

“Mm,” Ezra hums thoughtfully. “Listen a little closer. Clear your mind. Find your center. Find the balance inside yourself.”

Hera’s eyes drift closed, something soothing washing over her, here between the two of them, their hands grounded in Lothal’s grass, the spring sun warm overhead, the familiar feeling of both of them meditating beside her like something out of a dream.

The stillness wraps around them like a warm hug, and something overtakes her, something easy and calm, something that tugs at Hera’s mind, relaxes it. Hera feels something that could nearly be the phantom memory of a kiss on her forehead as her mind drifts off.

-

Hera feels more relaxed and well-rested than she has since Ezra’s been home, and maybe since longer than that. That’s the first thought that rises to the surface of her mind as she slowly wakes, her head pillowed in the soft grass, her body curled gently to one side: That she’s so, unbelievably relaxed, the kind of whole-body, full-mind relaxation she only ever used to feel back during the years Kanan shared her bed.

The second thought that rises to the surface is the dream she was just having. She’s struggling to remember it, feels it just out of her grasp, and it’s frustrating and unusual, this feeling of a dream barely fleeting away. She usually remembers her dreams either in stark detail or not at all. This feels different: A feeling of warmth, the idea of Kanan, smiling, pulling her gently to him, but their conversation, the specifics of their encounter, gone from her mind, some vague, soothing affection lingering in its wake.

Hera pushes herself up to sitting. “That was strange,” she says to no one, stretching her arms over her head.

She stills, a sudden terror ripping through her, cracking the surface of her mind’s relaxed state. _To no one._

Hera looks around, swiveling her head as far as she can in either direction. “Jace?” she calls out, her voice ringing strangely loudly through the starkly empty plain. “Jacen!”

She gets to her feet, turning in a full circle, looking around. The sun is lower in the sky, she realizes, and she checks her wrist chrono -- nearly two hours have passed. How, and why, did she even fall asleep in the first place?

“Ezra?” she calls.

A panic is quickly rising up in her chest, constructing her lungs and throat. The galaxy is so much safer, these days, but they’re still out here in the middle of basically nowhere, alone, and --

Hera lifts her wrist comm to her face. “Guys?” she asks. “Spectre Six, Spectre Seven? Come in,” she says, but there’s no response.

Of course, of _course_ , here, in this strange, powerful place, something like this happens.

Keep calm, she tries to tell herself. Keep calm, follow the plan. She’s drilled into Jacen since practically the first day he started walking that, if they ever got separated, their plan would always be to try to meet each other back at the last safe place they were both together.

So Hera starts walking, through the plain and back to the _Phantom_. She thinks while she walks about how she really shouldn’t have left Chopper at home, about how much better she always feels when she sends Chopper out exploring with Jacen, but there’s nothing she can do about her decision, now, and she tries to let the regret go.

Hera sits down in the open end of the _Phantom_ , pulling her knees to her chest. She lifts her wrist up again, says, into her comm, “Ezra? Jacen? Do either of you copy?”

There’s no response, and Hera heaves out a deep, heavy sigh, bows her head, cups her forehead in both her hands, her elbows braced on her knees. “They’ll be fine,” she whispers to herself, not believing herself, somehow thinking, maybe, that speaking it, soft and anxious into the palms of her hands, could make it true.

But she can nearly hear herself, herself in the past with a counter-argument, her response ringing through her mind: “I used to always believe that.”

There’s an odd sensation, suddenly, that distracts her from that memory but also sharpens it: A sensation like a hand on her shoulder, and it’s so _familiar_. Hera gasps, moves her own hand to her shoulder, across her chest, covering the warmth of the phantom touch, trapping it there, and it reminds her so much of feeling something so much like it, the last time they were here, in this place.

She sits there, lost, for a long moment, in her memories and in the feeling of the hand that isn’t really but is on her shoulder, her worry mixing and morphing with her grief and her memories: Of Kanan, of Ezra, of Jacen, of this place, of everything that’s led the three of them, today, back here, to this strangely full emptiness.

“Mom!” Jacen’s shout breaks through her thoughts.

Hera stands up, notices the way the phantom sensation drifts away, the quiet, strange comfort it leaves behind with her as it goes. Jacen’s running toward her full-tilt, his left hand closed in a fist. She smiles as he gets closer, a surge of simple affection washing over her at the way his little lekku billow behind him, prominent between his newly-trimmed hair.

“Mama,” Jacen says as he nears her, and he’s not slowing down, she realizes just barely in time. He throws himself at her, her arms opening just quickly enough to catch him, and he’s winding his arms around her neck, locking his legs around her hips, pressing his sweaty face into the crook of her neck, panting from the effort of running.

“Where have you been?” Hera asks, but Jacen’s pulling back, just enough to look her in the eye, his arms still around her neck, his right hand closed around the collar of her shirt, his left hand still clenched in a fist around -- something.

“Mama, I have to tell you something,” Jacen says, frowning, looking unusually serious, troubled.

“What is it, love?” she asks, adjusting her hold on him on her hip, reaching up with her freer hand to smooth the sweat from his forehead.

“Dad says he loves you,” Jacen says, and he’s pitching forward in her hold again, pressing his face back into her. “We both really love you,” he says, and he’s shaking, Hera realizes, the moisture she feels on his face not just his sweat.

“Oh, Jace, baby,” she says, and she carefully shifts her weight and his together, eases herself back down to the floor of the open end of the _Phantom_ , moving him so that he’s sitting in her lap, her feet dangling off the edge of the open hatch, his legs and arms still around her, his face pressed into her chest. Jacen’s always been a happy, easy kid, hardly ever cried for no reason when he was little, and it’s shocking to her to see him crying right now. “Slow down, love,” she says, rubbing his back, petting his hair. “What happened?”

“A lot,” he says. “A lot happened, I had to --” He sniffs, and he’s sitting up in her lap, wiping at his face, scrubbing his fist under his nose, breathing hard.

“Shh,” Hera says, reaching for him, wiping his tears with her thumb. “Slow and easy, love. Find your breath.”

Jacen closes his eyes, breathes slow and intentional through his nose, just like Sabine’s taught him, lets it out through his mouth. “I had to be brave through some scary things,” he tells her. He opens his eyes. “But I _saw Dad._ And, look,” he adds, unwinding his left arm from around her neck, opening his fist. It’s a sparkling crystal, small and faintly green, and a strange horror flares in Hera’s chest, a deep-seated fear that’s punching through her, that’s walking hand in hand with an immense sense of pride, of excitement -- a new, more defined version of the duality of the sorrow and joy that always strikes her when he reminds her of Kanan.

“Oh, I want to hear all about how you got this,” Hera tells him. “But I want Ezra to hear, too.” She looks him in the eye. “Was he with you?”

Jacen shakes his head. “No,” he says. “I was alone, until -- until Dad.”

“Hmm,” Hera hums thoughtfully, her interest in Jacen’s adventure eclipsed, briefly, by her worry over Ezra’s absence. “Do you think you know where he is, love? I think it’s time for us to go home, soon.”

“Yeah,” Jacen says. “We should go home. Wai Gong’s coming now.”

“Oh, is he?” Hera asks. Cham hadn’t told her exactly when he’d get in, had said maybe it would have to be tomorrow.

“Yeah,” Jacen says. He closes his eyes for a moment, his face stilling. “Ezra’s really sad,” he says softly.

“Where is he?” Hera asks him.

Jacen opens his eyes. “Back where we were.” He slides off her lap. “Let’s go get him.”

Hera stands up. “Can I put your crystal in a safe place?” she asks. He nods, opening his left hand again, letting her take it; she slides it into a small pocket on the front of her coveralls, struck by the distinctive way it feels warm and almost strangely alive there, so close to her heart, nearly vibrating, reminding her of a purring loth-cat.

As they walk, Jacen offers a steady stream of little details to her, nothing that really tells her _what_ happened exactly, but small, insightful things, things like: “Dad looked like he did in that one holo from Yavin, except his eyes were the same as mine,” and, “I was really scared, but I was brave,” and, “Ezra’s sad sometimes because he forgets he’s not alone.”

Hera resists the urge to ask him a thousand questions, forces herself to just listen, to let him talk about this the way he needs to, at least in this first flurry of telling, to be there for him however he needs her to be after this, what she’s pretty sure is his first strong experience with the supernatural side of the Force. She doesn’t let go of his hand as they walk, his fingers twined tight between hers. She’s listening and nodding and making affirmative hums of acknowledgement, but she’s also thinking of Kanan -- of the way, one night, with an immense and quiet pride, he’d pulled her close, whispered, “You’ll never believe what happened in the temple,” told her about how he’d been _knighted_ by the _Force itself,_ still almost couldn’t believe that it’d happened --

“Here,” Jacen says, stopping abruptly, bringing her back to the moment.

Hera looks around. “You sure?” she asks. There’s no sign of Ezra at all.

“Yup,” Jacen says. “Wait a minute.”

They stand there, looking around the empty clearing, a little time passing, Hera quietly running her thumb over the back of Jacen’s hand, the ridges of his knuckles.

“You sure, Jace?” she asks him again after a couple minutes.

Jacen slides his hand away from hers, takes a couple steps toward the hills to their left. “Ezra?” he calls, his head tilted to one side. “Ezra, I’m here.”

And there’s Ezra, suddenly, emerging unnaturally from between two tall rocks in the side of the hill as though they’ve parted for him, clambering down, making for Jacen with quick steps.

Ezra drops to his knees in front of Jacen. Jacen wraps his arms around Ezra’s neck, and Ezra wraps his around Jacen’s middle, and Ezra presses his face into Jacen’s chest. Jacen’s hand finds Ezra’s hair, smoothing over his head. “I know,” Jacen says. “You got scared too, huh?”

Hera’s at Jacen’s side in a moment, her heart breaking at the sound of Ezra’s sobs, muffled into Jacen’s torso. “Ezra, love,” she says, dropping to her knees, too, putting one hand on Ezra’s back, the other on Jacen’s. “Talk to us,” she says, rubbing her hand over Ezra’s back.

He turns his head, presses his face into the crook of Hera’s neck, still holding tight to Jacen, sniffling.

“I’m sorry,” he gasps out, leaning heavily into her. “I’m sorry, Hera.”

“You have nothing to be sorry for,” she says.

“I’m sorry I was gone,” Ezra says. “I’m sorry I -- had to leave. I’m sorry Kanan had to go. I’m sorry he’s gone.”

“Ezra,” Hera says.

“I saw him, Hera,” Ezra says. “I thought I would find him here, and then I did, and --” He shakes his head against her. “I miss him,” he says, his voice cracking desperately. “I miss him so much. It hurts, more than -- so much more than I thought it would.” Ezra’s quiet for a moment, crying against Hera’s shoulder, though she can tell he’s trying to get himself under control, calm himself down. “I never --” he adds with a sobbing breath. “I guess I never really -- grieved. Just like -- just like when my parents, remember? I never really -- _dealt_ with it -- until -- until Kanan helped.” He sighs. “It was the same, losing him. I tried to push it away, but since I’ve been home, it’s been like, like it was yesterday, like I never really --” He sighs, pulls in a shaky breath. “I miss him so much.”

“Ezra,” Jacen says, patient, wise beyond and above his seven long years. Ezra lifts his head, sniffs, pulls back, looks up at Jacen. “Life doesn’t cease at death, remember? Just changes form.” Jacen lifts his hand from Ezra’s hair, taps at Ezra’s chest, and Hera wonders, again, what passed between her son and the Force, in the past two hours. “Dad’s here, in our feelings,” he says softly. “You’ll never be alone.”

Ezra’s bottom lip trembles, and he nods. “You’re so smart,” he says shakily. “So right.”

“We were meant to be here, together, right?” Jacen asks. Ezra nods

“We were meant to be together,” Ezra agrees. “I’m just sorry that I -- that it took me so long to come home.”

“It’s okay,” Jacen says. “We’re together, now.”

Hera wants to -- to help, somehow, to say something, but she doesn’t even know where to start.

Jacen turns to Hera. “Oh, Mom, show him what I got,” he says. Hera fishes into the small pocket on her coveralls, pulls out Jacen’s crystal, cradles it carefully in her open palm. “With Dad,” he clarifies.

“Wow,” Ezra says, eyeing the crystal even as he sniffs, wipes at his face. “I’m impressed, kiddo.” He looks at Jacen, narrows his eyes in thought, squeezes Jacen’s shoulder. “So, you saw him too?”

Jacen nods. “Yeah,” he says. “I know you’re sad right now, but I’m happy. It -- it was scary at first, but I was happy to see Dad. I’m really happy we came here, together,” he says.

Ezra smiles weakly. “Well, then, I’m happy, too,” he says.

Ezra looks at Hera. “Did --” he starts. “Did you -- did you see him?”

Hera bites her lip, slowly shakes her head. “Not -- not really,” she says. “I -- I don’t know how, or why, but I -- I fell asleep, and, when I woke up, you guys were gone.”

“But you didn’t see him?” Ezra asks. She thinks, thinks about the phantom touch, decides it was something that was just for her -- and, besides, it’s not what Ezra’s thinking, not what he wants to know. So she shakes her head again, and his face falls. “I was so sure,” he says, soft, almost to himself. “I was sure there was something of him here, for all three of us. Sure that he would be here, even for you.”

Hera looks between Ezra, his eyes red-rimmed and watery still, his face serious and splotchy and sad, and Jacen, his face clear, his eyes the same bright teal that Kanan’s had been, something light and wise in the lift at the corners of his mouth, the soft, affectionate smile that’s playing over his face.

The grief that Ezra’s been carrying with him since he got home, the pain -- it’s enough that it threatens to break her heart, fills her with regret and with sadness over his lengthy separation from the rest of them, the delayed healing, the extended trauma he’s been subjected to. But the peace and the lightness and the wisdom that’ve settled over Jacen, watching him comfort Ezra -- that’s enough that it’s swelling her heart with love and affection and fondness, some perfect mixture within him of herself and Kanan and the rest of their family and his own, unique, optimistic, curious self. Nothing will ever make up for losing Kanan, but these two, they're his legacy, the things that continue on after life ceases. Sorrow and joy, walking hand in hand.

“But there _is_ something here for me,” she says. They both look at her curiously, and she smiles, squeezes them both where one of her hands rest of each of their backs. “It’s you guys,” she says. “I see Kanan, every day, in both of you,” she says, and something’s tight in her throat suddenly, and she doesn’t mean to start crying, it just happens.

“Mama,” Jacen says, and he leans into her, one arm around her neck, his sharp little chin pressing into the top of her shoulder.

Ezra leans into her other side, turns his face into the side of her neck. “Hera,” he whispers.

“I love you both so, so much,” Hera says, her voice breaking a little, turning her head first to the right and then to the left, pressing a kiss to the sides of first Jacen’s and then Ezra’s foreheads. “Kanan, too,” she adds. “I know he loves you both so much. And I know it’s sad, feeling him gone, right?”

Ezra nods against her.

“But we’re a family still,” she whispers. “You’re home now, Ezra. We’re all together again. And, like you said, Jace, we’ll never be alone, right?” she asks around the silent tears sliding down her cheeks, just a few, her heart so full that they have to fall, to make room for everything she’s feeling.

“Right,” Jacen says. “We have hope,” he says. “Hope that things can get better -- and they will.” Ezra whips his head up, looks at Jacen with longing and surprise and pain in the lines around his raised eyebrows.

“Did Ezra tell you about that time?” Hera asks, raising a curious eyebrow at Jacen.

He shakes his head. “Nah,” he says. “Dad.” He looks at her. “Sometimes you’re the one who knows the right thing to say, Mom,” he says, and she laughs, shakes her head.

“You guys had quite the conversation, huh,” she says. He smiles, nods, but doesn’t have anything more to tell her, for the moment, the three of them just lingering together, kneeling there, holding each other, silent, for a long moment.

A sharp, lonely sound breaks the silence between the three of them: A long, mystical howl. Hera gasps, jerks her head around toward the preternatural sound. There, on top of the range of small hills to their left, stands a lone, white, loth-wolf, its head tilted toward the sun. Its coat glimmers in the golden, pre-sunset light that’s shining warm on them, and Hera swears it looks her straight in the eye before tilting its head back again, continuing its eerie, sad howl.

The three of them look at each other, transfixed, for a moment, by the sound.

“I think it’s time to go home now,” Jacen says slowly.

Hera gets to her feet, reaches for Jacen, something in the wolf’s howl sending an overwhelming desire through her to protect him, to pick him up, heavy and big and independent and old though he is now. He lets her without questioning it, wrapping his arms around her neck and his legs around her waist, settling in on her hip, leaning his head against her shoulder. Ezra stands, too, winding one arm around Hera’s back, simultaneously helping hold Jacen’s weight and leaning the side of his head against Hera’s shoulder.

“I think you’re right, kiddo,” Ezra says.

-

Jacen graciously lets Ezra take the co-pilot’s seat in the _Phantom_ , though he plops right down onto Ezra’s lap, blatantly ignoring all the flight safety rules Hera’s tried to teach both of them over the years. She lets it go this one time, Ezra’s arms securely around Jacen’s shoulders, Jacen’s legs dangling off the left side of the seat, the side of his head pressed against Ezra’s chest, his eyes on Hera, watching her fly. Nothing bad will happen, a TIE isn’t going to come shoot them out of the sky, and Ezra will catch Jacen in the event of a crash, she tells herself, keeping the corner of her right eye on them the entire time.

“See?” Jacen asks, the first thing any of the three of them have said for the whole flight, when they’re in sight of home. She’d thought he’d drifted asleep, and maybe he was, for a bit, but now he’s sitting up straight, looking out over the open roof of the docking bay with a smile. “Told you Wai Gong was here, Mom.”

That’s Cham’s ship, all right. They never dock in the public spaceport in Kothal or Capital City anymore, but rather in their own private docking bay that Sabine had built, just outside Ezra’s old communications tower, which she turned into her base and the unofficial Mandalorian embassy after the war. This morning when they left, the _Ghost_ was the only ship here -- but now, it looks like not only Cham’s here, but also Ahsoka, which means Rex and Wolffe, too. The _Shadowcaster_ ’s also shown up, and Hera spots a fleet of speeders parked outside that most likely belong to Ryder and Jai and Mart.

“Told you,” Jacen says again.

“Yes, you did,” Hera agrees.

Once she docks the _Phantom_ to the _Ghost_ , he’s off, only the briefest of goodbyes to Hera and Ezra before he’s running through the docking bay, greeting all the new visitors, giving out hugs, accepting their birthday wishes.

Ezra and Hera linger back, sitting on the open ramp of the _Ghost_ with Sabine and Zeb and Kallus, the five of them just watching Jacen work the group for awhile, all of them unusually quiet, as though Sabine and Zeb and Kallus can tell that something profound happened to Hera and Ezra.

“Quite a lot of supper to make,” Zeb says eventually. He lays his hand affectionately on the top of Ezra’s head as he goes to the galley, Kallus trailing him.

“Ezra,” Sabine starts, quiet, tentative. “Do you wanna talk about it?”

Ezra shakes his head. “Not really,” he says, pulling his knees tighter to his chest. It’s exactly what he said a half-hour ago, too, but Sabine still frowns at him. Ezra sighs, looks between Sabine and Hera. He lays his chin on his knees, his face turned to Sabine. “You know what Kanan told me, once?” he starts.

“What?” Sabine asks.

Ezra’s quiet for a long moment, a moment in which Hera wishes she could see his face. She’s watching Sabine, the frown that’s tugging at her mouth. Sabine glances up at Hera, meets her eyes, an unspoken question drifting between them.

“What, Ezra?” Sabine asks again, cutting her eyes back to him.

Ezra sighs. “There’s a future for us,” he says. “One where we’re all free. But it’s up to us to make it happen.” He straightens his back, crosses his legs and folds his hands anxiously in his lap, looking quickly between Hera and Sabine, something tired weighing down the lines in his face. “That idea used to give me so much hope,” he says. “It’s what I thought I was doing, saving Lothal from the Empire, saving our family from Thrawn. Saving the future.”

He lapses into silence again, the three of them looking at one another before turning their gaze back out to the landing bay. Cham is one of Jacen’s favorite people outside the immediate family, so of course he’s dropped what he was doing to play with Jacen. They’re currently playing a fairly animated game of catch, throwing a small ball back and forth, Cham frequently feinting to the side, ducking behind something in the bay, throwing the ball to someone else walking by, pulling them into the game -- anything to try to rile Jacen, put him off guard. Ketsu is who they’ve pulled into the game at the moment, and she’s somehow turned it from catch to tag, chasing Jacen, who’s holding the ball, laughing and running. “Uncle Rex!” Jacen screeches at the top of his lungs, giggling, “Catch, you’re it!” He throws the ball to an unsuspecting Rex, who laughs, too, lobs it back over to Cham, sending Jacen sprinting to the other end of the bay.

Hera smiles, watching them play. However grown-up Jacen had to be today, whatever fears he faced during the trial of being granted the crystal that’s still tucked safely into the pocket of her flight suit, he’s still her happy, bright, kind kid, barely touched and yet wholly shaped by the war, always pulling other people into his orbit. He’s everything she and Kanan could’ve been, everything Ezra and Sabine could’ve been, but for the circumstances of how they were raised, and Hera’s grateful, so, so, grateful, for everything that so many people did to end the Empire, to end the war, so that Jacen, and all the other kids in his generation, could have a chance to grow up like this, in a loving family, the specter of death not lurking around every corner.

“But are we truly free?” Ezra asks quietly. Hera looks back at him, at the shadows in his face that have nothing to do with the twilight falling outside. He turns, looks at Sabine. “Did we really make that future happen?”

Sabine shrugs. “We’ll always have more work to do,” she says, thoughtful, even. “Even though all worlds are free from Imperial control now, there’s still the negotiations between the New Republic and the independent systems. And there’s poverty, hunger, gender inequality, work conditions --”

“That’s not exactly what I meant,” Ezra says.

“I know,” Sabine says. “But it’s true.”

Ezra looks back over at Hera. “Was it worth it?” he asks. “What Kanan and I -- what we had to do? Are we all -- are we all _free_?”

Hera thinks about Ezra’s question, glances back out at Jacen, running and laughing after the ball still, Cham and Rex now throwing it in high arcs over his head. “Stop, I can’t get it!” Jacen argues, and Rex laughs.

“What do you mean _you_ can’t get it, little one?” Rex asks. “I know you can. Reach out.” He throws the ball over Jacen’s head again, Cham catching it easily.

Jacen frowns, concentration in the lines between his eyebrows, and when Cham throws the ball back to Rex, Jacen bends his knees and _jumps_. It’s unnatural, something he only could’ve done by calling on the Force, launching himself ten feet vertically into the air, catching the ball easily, but it lacks control: He tumbles down hard and rough, landing in an aborted somersault, his limbs all akimbo.

Sabine gasps, and Hera feels her breath catch in her chest as she watches him fall, but before she can do anything about it, Jacen’s back on his feet, his grin big and crooked and toothy, and the joy and sorrow are walking hand in hand up to her again, in the way his smile reminds her of Kanan’s. “Did you _see_ that!” he exclaims to everyone within earshot and no one in particular, throwing the ball back to Rex, starting the game again.

“Oh, that was a close one,” Sabine says, looking at Hera over the top of Ezra’s head.

“He’s fine,” Ezra says, distant but sure.

Hera looks back to Ezra, considering his questions, considering the heavy weight of pain and worry that slopes his shoulders, deepens the lines in his face, makes him look so much older than he is, so much older than even Kanan seemed, when he was the same age Ezra is now, despite everything he’d had to live through. Ezra still hasn’t told her everything that happened to him, these past eight years, everything he had to endure, but Hera suspects it’ll take him twice as many years, at least, to recover from all the trials he faced out there, in wild space.

“I don’t know that we’re all free,” she finally says. “I think, those of us who lived through the war, we’ll never be free from it, not entirely. But we can learn to let go of it, even as we keep living with it.”

Hera looks back at Jacen, still playing with his grandfather and with the group of people who’ve been folded into their adoptive, extended family. “I think, what we did? We gave his generation not just the idea of hope, but the _reality_ of hope.” She looks back over at Ezra. “They can start to work on those things Sabine’s working on, on being able to start trying to make not just a future, but a _present_ where we’re truly all free, because of what we did, the battles we fought, the sacrifices we made.” She pauses, thinks, of Kanan’s touch and Ezra’s grief and Jacen’s optimism. “Fighting the war, doing the things we had to do -- I think -- I hope -- it was worth it.”

Hera reaches over, squeezes Ezra’s right shoulder with her left hand. “Things can always get better, right?” she asks him. “They already have, even though there’s a ways to go still.” Her hand slides down Ezra’s back, rubbing it, and she scoots closer to him, puts her arm around his shoulders, pulls him to her, the right side of his head hitting her left shoulder. “Things can get better,” she says, “and they will.”

-

It’s been a long day, but it’s still Jacen’s birthday and this is still Hera’s house, and everyone -- all eighteen of them who have managed to gather themselves here this evening -- knows the traditions, the routines of Syndulla birthdays, by now, so they’re doing what they always do: Carrying on.

The weather’s nice, the night falling cool but not so much so that they feel the need to close the roof of the landing bay. Everyone drags crates and folding chairs out from their own ships, into the middle of the bay, making their own version of a banquet table. Zeb brings all the fixings out for everyone to make their own sticky rice bowls -- meat, fruit, toppings -- and Jacen seems supremely satisfied, sitting next to Hera, digging into a bowl of eel and meiloorun and tamago, listening to the threads of conversation around them as everyone eats, relaxes, enjoys one another's company.

He’s still young enough that all his candles fit easily on the top of the cake that Chopper brings out of the _Ghost_ at the end of dinner, carefully balancing the tray between his manipulators as he sets it down on the table in front of Jacen, the candles already lit.

“Do you remember, love?” Hera asks him quietly, one hand on his shoulder. Jacen nods, straightens up in his seat, everyone quieting down, looking expectantly at him.

“We honor those who came before us,” he says. “And we thank them for giving us life, and a reason to keep fighting.” Jacen reaches for Hera under the table, and she offers him her hand, feels him wind his fingers betweens hers. “Thank you, Dad, and all the others who passed during the war,” he says. Hera’s heart does a funny flip at the fact that, this year, finally, no one has to remind him to include Ezra.

“And we wish,” he starts, but he frowns, glancing over at her.

“We wish that we can use the upcoming year,” she prompts him softly.

“Oh,” he says. “Yeah. That we can use the upcoming year to continue to honor them and improve ourselves,” he finishes.

“Make your wish, love,” Hera says, and Jacen closes his eyes, leans forward, blows the candles out.

Everyone’s smiling and clapping and saying happy birthday, but Jacen leans in close to Hera. “I wish to be the best legacy,” he whispers in her ear.

“Is that what you and your dad talked about today?” she asks him, and he nods. “We all love you so much,” she tells him, leaning over, kissing his forehead. “Happy birthday, baby.”

-

That night, with Jacen tucked in close to her in her bed, already asleep, his breathing deep and even and comforting, Hera thinks back to the warm, relaxed sensation that was with her when she woke up, earlier this afternoon, at the old temple grounds.

She focuses on that feeling, on relaxing her mind and her body, on letting her breath slow down to match the steady rhythm of Jacen’s.

The last thing Hera thinks of, as she drifts -- or maybe it’s the first thing she knows in her dream, she isn’t sure -- is Kanan’s voice, a far-away memory, but also something so near and close to her that she thinks it must be a truth, something happening fresh, new.

The past month, since Ezra’s been home, has been the most frequently she’s thought about Kanan in years. Though she’ll always carry him with her, she’d let him fade into the background of her heart, her hurt mostly healed, her grief mostly assuaged, her energy directed to Jacen and the rest of her family, to her work. Recently, and especially today, he’s been in the front of her mind in an intense way he hasn’t been in years.

So it’s been awhile since she’s felt like she could hear him, like this, in her dreams, and she tries to hold the feeling close, to see if she can remember it, in the morning.

“We did good, love,” he’s telling her, gentle, proud, and she can nearly feel his hands on her jaw, his lips between her lekku. “Raised some good kids.”

“Yeah,” she agrees. “We really, really did.”

-

In the morning, Jacen’s gone before she wakes up, which surprises her a bit, because usually he’s the one waking her up with his wiggles and his restless sleep.

Hera gets up, goes through the motions of getting dressed, passing through the fresher and heading to the galley for her first cup of caf, thinking about what needs to get done today. Some things never change.

There’s no one around the galley, which Hera also finds a little unusual, given how many people are in the base, right now. She sets the electric kettle to boil and leans against the counter, waiting for it. There’s a faint sound of voices floating in from outside the ship, and Hera fixes her cup of caf once the water boils, then sets off to investigate, sipping from it as she walks.

There, in the clearing between everyone’s ships, Ezra and Sabine are sparring, walking energetically through the forms Kanan taught them both so long ago, both of Ahsoka’s lightsabers in Sabine’s hands, Ezra holding his own saber, all three weapons turned to their training modes.

Ahsoka’s watching them with a keen eye, offering corrections and suggestions here and there. Although Sabine’s not a traditional Force-sensitive being, Ahsoka has remarked proudly, before, that Sabine is a better practitioner of jar’kai than many Jedi were, back in the day, and right now, sweaty and ferocious, a dangerous smile on her face as she spars with Ezra, she looks the part of some ancient warrior queen, a shimmering blade in each hand.

Several of the others are sitting and standing around the edge of the area where they’re practicing, watching them. Ezra’s been slow to take his saber back up in front of anyone, and this is both the most relaxed and the most intense Hera’s seen him be about training since he’s been home, sweat rolling down both their foreheads, glistening in the early morning light, both of them smiling and laughing as they spar, friendly but aggressive. Hera watches them for a long moment, sipping her caf, noticing the way Ezra’s shoulders don’t seem quite as heavy as they did yesterday.

She takes a few steps toward the on-lookers, smiling good morning at everyone, sliding onto the edge of the crate Zeb’s sitting on, appreciating Sabine’s sharp, controlled movements in contrast with Ezra’s fluid grace.

But it’s Jacen who really catches her eye, as she looks around the space.

He’s standing off to the side, a little behind Ahsoka, where he can see everything Sabine and Ezra are doing. At first, Hera had thought he was just watching and vibrating in the way his little kid body still does sometimes, but she realizes quickly that he’s not just wiggling around, he’s training, too, in his own way. He’s holding his hands out in front of him in the defensive fighting stance Sabine’s taught him, and his footwork unmistakably follows Ezra’s, his steps powerful and deliberate as he moves from form to form.

“Good,” Ahsoka pronounces as Ezra and Sabine wind their session down, grinning at one another, breathing heavily.

Most of the onlookers disperse, and Sabine hands Ahsoka’s sabers back to her, dashes to the _Ghost_. “Morning, Hera!” she calls.

“Morning, sweetheart,” Hera replies, watching her go.

Jacen’s gone up to Ezra, now, and is asking him about a move, putting his feet into an approximation of the position for Form Three. “Mm, not quite,” Ezra says, still catching his breath and wiping sweat from his forehead, but showing him his own stance, explaining to him where to adjust his feet.

Sabine comes back with two bottles of water. “Thanks,” Ezra says, taking one from her, taking a long drink. “What do you think about the back foot in Three?” he asks her between sips of water, and she’s taking up the lesson, now, too, taking Ezra’s saber from him, turning it back on, demonstrating a solid foundation versus a weak one, the effect each has on a strike and a block.

Ahsoka has crossed the bay, sits down next to Hera.

“Kanan taught them well,” she says. Hera turns to look at her, at the satisfied smile on her face.

“Jacen --” Hera starts, not quite a question. “He was meant to be Ezra’s padawan.”

Ahsoka tilts her head at her. “Perhaps,” she says, in that slow, esoteric way of hers. “But perhaps not in title.”

Ahsoka watches Ezra and Sabine and Jacen for a moment before turning back to Hera. “He was meant to be Ezra’s family,” she says. “And so were you.” She eyes Hera keenly. “They were meant to be the way they are, attached, following the Jedi spirit, but living outside the Order. To find a balance, a balance those of us raised in the Order could never have found.”

Hera nods, thinking about Kanan, thinking, maybe, after all these years of living with the Force all around her, she’s starting to understand how special it is, here, concentrated in her family like this. “Well,” she says. “I hope we’re getting there.”

“Yes,” Ahsoka says. “I think you are.”

The lesson’s winding down, Ezra drinking from his water bottle and listening as Sabine finishes explaining the footwork question to Jacen. “I’ve gotta go shower,” Sabine’s saying, “you really worked me hard, Ezra,” and she’s smiling at him and he’s smiling at her, and she’s jogging back off to the _Ghost_ again.

Ezra turns to go, too, but he pauses, turns back to Jacen.

“What is it?” Ezra asks him, even though Jacen didn’t say anything. Ezra tilts his head at him, his left hand on his hip, his right drifting to Jacen’s left shoulder. Jacen’s looking up at him, and Hera’s struck by how the memories are echoing, unbidden, through her mind: pictures of Ezra and Kanan in nearly the same pose Jacen and Ezra hold now. She watches them watching one another, and she’s struck by how _sure_ she feels that there’s something passing there between Jacen and Ezra in the Force, by how much Ezra feels to her like the connecting refrain from some old, familiar poem, Kanan the opening verse, Jacen the second.

“Dad said you could show me,” Jacen says, and Hera has the distinct feeling she’s not getting the entire conversation, the whole question, somehow.

“Yeah,” Ezra says slowly. “There are a lot of things. A lot of bad things, but also a lot of good things.” He tilts his head to the other side, takes his left hand off his hip, runs it over his hair, sighs.

Ezra squeezes Jacen’s shoulder, says, “Let me talk to your mom first, okay?” and Jacen’s nodding, and they’re both walking back to the _Ghost_ , the moment broken.

-

Later that afternoon, Ezra catches up with Hera while she’s elbow-deep in the _Shadowcaster_ with Sabine and Ketsu, trying to fix an issue with the primary weapons system’s calibration. “Hey, Hera,” he says, and she startles, nearly whacks her head on the underside of the panel at the sound of his voice. He shouldn’t still be surprising her like this, but she supposes it’s gonna take more than a month of his presence to balance out eight long years of his absence.

“What is it?” she asks, looking up at him, his image distorted from behind her work goggles.

“I wanna ask you something,” he says.

“We got this,” Ketsu says, and Hera hands over her wrench, gets up, takes off her goggles. Ezra starts walking; Hera follows him, out of the landing bay, outside. They stand together quietly, looking out at the sun shining over the tall grasses between their settlement and Kothal, miles away, its new, tall buildings visible in the distance over the flat plains.

“What is it?” Hera finally asks him again.

Ezra huffs out a deep sigh. “Hera,” he starts. “Years ago -- on Yavin -- Kanan --” He sighs again.

Hera hasn’t thought about that time in years, but she thinks she knows where he’s going. “The day after your birthday?” she asks, and he nods, cutting his eyes over to her.

“Wait, you knew about that?” he asks.

“He told me he -- gave you some memories, of his, of ours, to carry,” she says.

Ezra nods. “I want to -- to start showing Jacen some things.” He huffs out another sigh. “Hera,” he says, wringing his hands, shifting his weight nervously from one foot to the other. “I think -- I think I’m -- being called, to -- to train Jacen.”

“I know,” Hera says, turning to face him, laying one hand on his elbow. “I know you are.”

“You’re -- wait, you’re okay with it?” he asks, raising both his eyebrows.

She smiles, shakes her head. “If I wasn’t, I would have said something already,” she says.

“Okay,” Ezra says, smiling, maybe more broadly than she’s seen since he’s been home. He throw both his arms around her, pulling her close in an impulsive hug. “I missed you,” he whispers.

“Start with the good stuff, okay?” Hera asks, hugging him tight, cupping the back of his head in one hand, rubbing his back with the other. “Missed you too.”

“Yeah,” Ezra says. “We will.”

As he pulls back from the hug, his hands sliding down her arms, resting in her hands, Ezra looks her in the eye. “Hera,” he says seriously. “I want to get it right. I never want him to be alone, just -- just like how Kanan never left me alone. I promise you, I’ll care for him, the way Kanan always cared for me.”

Hera smiles, affection for Ezra and gratitude to the Force for guiding him back to their family surging through her, filling every crack that loss and sorrow have made in her heart, these past years, with a new joy, a new hope, for healing and growth, for all of them, together. Part of her wants to fear this, wants to be afraid of losing Jacen the way they lost Kanan, but her steadfast belief that Ezra _knows_ what he’s doing, her faith in his earnest promise, quiets the fear, tucks it away, tells it that this is the future Kanan was working for.

“I know you will,” she says, squeezing both his hands in both of hers.

“Thank you,” he says.

And, the next morning, when the sun is rising and Hera spots them, kneeling together in that familiar old meditation pose in the tall grass under the shadow of the tower, one of Ezra’s hands at Jacen’s temple and one of Jacen’s at Ezra’s, she smiles more.

“Just the good stuff, okay, kiddo,” she hears Ezra say.

“Yeah,” Jacen says, sure, excited, hopeful. “The good stuff.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you so much for reading to the end of this whole minibang that accidentally became a bang length! if you liked this, [stick around on tumblr](https://inconocible.tumblr.com/) and look for my next long fic, which i hope to start posting in november. it’s the matching pair to this story <3
> 
> to the following folks who nurtured me and this fic over the past several months, thank you so much:  
> my artist, [esmiora](http://esmiora.tumblr.com/) <3 thank you again <3  
> my beta, [lessattitudemorealtitude](https://archiveofourown.org/users/LessAttitudeMoreAltitude) \- i was so so glad to have made a new friend through this minibang. thank you for trusting me to be a random stranger with your work, and for being someone i could trust with my work. i appreciate you very much <3 -- [check out their minibang here](https://archiveofourown.org/collections/swrminibang/works/16299374)!  
> my two favorite people on this corner of the internet and two folks who have been such such good friends and cheerleaders for this fic and others, [mumblingmaria](https://archiveofourown.org/users/mumblingmaria) and [brahe](https://archiveofourown.org/users/brahe) \- love you both so, so very much. <3 <3 -- [check out maria’s minibang here](https://archiveofourown.org/works/16311290), and brahe’s minibang here [link tba when they post]!  
> and, finally, the starbucks in my city where at least 85% of this was written, especially my favorite barista, pete, thanks for always being so friendly and for keeping the space in a nice writing aesthetic.
> 
> the moods for this chapter - saturn by sleeping at last, the sun will come up, the seasons will change by nina nesbitt, and way down low by elley duhe (again)


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